To restore is to revive
A free guided visit revealing how damaged canvases of the French school were revived by the artist Alixe Fu.
Saturday 19 September → Sunday 20 September 2026
Free — limited places, book online.
Repairing becomes painting
Heritage at risk: revive, resist, reimagine
The heritage of photography
For the European Heritage Days, LabMusée in Auvers-sur-Oise opens Alixe Fu's permanent exhibition free of charge. Anonymous 18th- and 19th-century canvases, painted by students of the French school and damaged by time, are reborn under the artist's hand: restoration becomes an act of painting that does not conceal history but reveals it.
The guided visit does not stop at commentary: it ends with a conversation among the works, where the questions matter as much as the answers. That is why the groups stay small.
Guided talk and conversation led by Clermont Fu, director of LabMusée.
From torn canvas to revived canvas
Double portrait à la lecture
Toile XIXᵉ ~ 2012 · Huile sur toile · Anti-Rétro — Portraits métissés
Holed, torn, flaking: the canvas seemed lost. Alixe Fu did not try to make it look new. He filled the losses with a new landscape and laid lace masks over the faces — the bourgeois portrait remains, but now it looks out at our own time.
One booking, the rest freely open
Guided visit & conversation
A forty-five-minute guided talk before the revived canvases: where they came from, why they were damaged, and how the Anti-Retro — Mixed Portraits project turned them into new works. Led by Clermont Fu, director of LabMusée, it flows into an open conversation. Two departures a day, at 2:30 pm and 4:30 pm.
Before / after display
Photographs of the canvases in their original state, shown facing the finished works — a direct echo of this year's second theme, the heritage of photography.
Sign-Me participatory table
A word, a drawing, your own mixed heritage: everyone revives something in turn, echoing the museum's Sign-Me Garden. Open all weekend.
Exhibition, sculpture garden & LabCafé
Freely open throughout, no booking needed: Saturday 2 pm to 6 pm, Sunday 10 am to 6 pm.
Damage left visible
Portrait à la coiffe de dentelle
The bonnet, the roses and the scarf of the original portrait remain intact. Behind the sitter a face rises from the background; on her forehead, a red dot joins two worlds.
Flore
An academic Flora whose canvas was torn along its lower part. Where the paint was missing, Alixe Fu brought a crowd of coloured figures to life; on the goddess's arm, a tattoo mixes two languages.
Pierrot aux ballons
An 18th-century fête galante: the figure keeps his costume and cape, but his face becomes a white mask, and three balloons drift off into a present-day sky.
Haleurs ramenant un Bateau
A 19th-century towpath canvas, taken up again in 2019: Alixe Fu's masked figures settle into the old landscape without erasing a single line of it.
The slots
Limited places
Two departures a day, at 2:30 pm and 4:30 pm. Each visit lasts 45 minutes and ends in conversation among the works — so the groups stay small.
Saturday 19 September
- 2:30 pm → 3:15 pmLimited places
- 4:30 pm → 5:15 pmLimited places
Sunday 20 September
- 2:30 pm → 3:15 pmLimited places
- 4:30 pm → 5:15 pmLimited places
- Where
- 23 rue du Pois, 95430 Auvers-sur-Oise
- Price
- Free
Booking your slot creates your Discovery Pass: a free temporary membership of the association, valid for the day. It grants access and lets us prepare for your visit.
Also issued at the desk on the day, subject to remaining places.