After being shown at the Tate Modern in London, the Louise Bourgeois retrospective arrives in Paris – the city where the New York-based artist was born on Christmas Day in 1911. Greeting visitors on the ground floor of the museum is one of her gigantic crouching spiders, whose legs have been dug into the floor. We find another in the main part of her exhibition on the sixth floor, in addition to sculptures of genitals, figures and cages, nearly all of which reference her childhood, sexuality and psychology. It's common knowledge that as a child, Bourgeois became aware of her father having an affair with her English nanny and that this painful experience has informed much of her work. The exhibition assembles over 200 works produced from 1938 to 2007, including paintings, drawings and engravings, some of which are being shown on the fourth floor. The lasting impression is that of Bourgeois' direct, radical and aggressive way of expressing herself artistically.

Louise Bourgeois
March 5 through June 2, 2008

Centre Pompidou
Place Georges Pompidou
75004 Paris
T. +33 (0)1 44 78 12 33