Louvre staff’s work stoppage shutters museum in Paris for hours

PARIS - On the morning of June 16, when droves of visitors lined up to enter the Louvre Museum to see some of the world’s most revered art, like the Mona Lisa, they were met with disappointing news.

The famed tourist magnet in Paris was not open and did not open for several hours because of a “social movement” started by staff, a museum spokesperson said.

Throughout the morning and under the blaring sun, lines of tourists snaked over the museum’s plaza and beneath the giant glass-and-steel pyramid designed by architect I.M. Pei.

But inside the museum, workers were meeting to discuss issues including workplace conditions and crowd management.

Mr Christian Galani, a spokesperson for the CGT-Culture labour union, which includes workers at the Louvre, said in an interview that at the end of their monthly meeting, the staff members decided to perform a wildcat strike – an unauthorised work stoppage without a vote by union membership.

“We didn’t plan to go on strike, but the people are so exhausted, they can’t support the conditions getting worse and worse,” Mr Galani said.

A spokesperson for the museum said in a statement that the staff members’ actions were not a strike but a “social movement” that caused the Louvre to close for about four hours.

A strike, according to French law, has to be announced.

Mr Galani said that in the past 15 years, some 200 jobs at the Louvre had been lost and that despite French President Emmanuel Macron’s promise to overhaul the museum in January, so far “nothing had changed”, and the average worker was stressed.

“There are too many visitors, and the rooms are in very bad condition,” he said. “It’s very difficult for the workers.”

The Louvre reopened at 2.30pm (8.30pm, Singapore time), a museum spokesperson said. It was unclear which staff members returned to work. The museum closed at 6pm and is scheduled to reopen on the morning of June 18. The museum is closed on Tuesdays.

For years, the Louvre has struggled to handle overcrowding, especially as many of its galleries were overrun by tour groups.

In early 2023, management announced it would limit daily attendance by about a third, to 30,000 people.

Before the Covid-19 pandemic, the museum could attract as many as 45,000 people a day.

By late 2023, the museum had announced more changes, including raising its basic ticket price to €22 (S$32) from €17 to help offset rising energy costs and support its free admission programs geared toward local residents.

The Louvre is home to more than 33,000 works of art, including many sculptures, paintings and antiques.

Among the most famous pieces is Leonardo da Vinci’s Mona Lisa. The 16th-century masterpiece’s immense popularity has burdened the Louvre with what is called the “Mona Lisa problem”.

Each day, thousands of tourists jam themselves into the gallery housing the painting to catch a quick glimpse or a take a selfie, creating headaches for staff and visitors.

Mr Macron announced in January that the Mona Lisa would move to its own exhibition space, one of several that would be installed underneath the Cour Carree, the Louvre’s easternmost courtyard, and connected to the existing museum.

The painting would be accessible separately from the rest of the museum and would require its own ticket.

The rising tensions at the Louvre came after a weekend of widespread protests in Italy, Portugal and Spain, where activists voiced frustrations over mass tourism in some European cities.

In Barcelona, some demonstrators held signs reading “Tourists go home” and “Tourism is stealing from us”.

The protests are part of a movement driven by concerns over quality of life, like high housing costs and environmental damage, which protest organisers say are brought on by overtourism. NYTIMES