Located in a beautiful private mansion built in the 18th century by Regnault de Beaulieu and enlarged around 1775 by Aimé-Benjamin Fleuriau, the Musée du Nouveau Monde was created in 1982 at the initiative of Mayor Michel Crépeau.
This Museum is intended to bear witness to the relations that France, and in particular La Rochelle, has had with the Americas since the 16th century and offers collections that are displayed in magnificent rocky and neoclassical spaces.
"A large painting of the port of La Rochelle after Joseph Vernet, engravings and old maps evoke the maritime relations and trade that developed since the discovery of Brazil, the West Indies and New France.
A set of furniture and works of art presented in the historic salons recalls the world of shipowners and their wealth. Tapestry, paintings and sculptures speak of America as seen through the imaginations of artists and writers from the early 17th century to Châteaubriant and Atala.
Several rooms present the history and populations of Canada or New France, from the founding of Quebec City in 1608 by the Saintongeais Samuel Champlain to the Treaty of Paris in 1763, which abandoned this territory to the English.
Around the exceptional photographic portraits of the Indians of the Edward Curtis Plains, some ethnographic objects speak of the fur trade and exchanges between trappers, traders and Indians or evoke the native tribes.
A large part of the collections is devoted to the West Indies, including Santo Domingo, where the people of Roche had many plantations.
The slave trade is also the subject of a special presentation as well as the abolition of slavery in relation to the evocation of the culture of sugar cane, tobacco and indigo.
Finally, José Conrado Roza's spectacular painting, "The Bridal Masquerade", a portrait of Brazilian dwarves from the court of the King of Portugal, and a few scenes depicting "savages" from Guyana illustrate South America.
New World Museum
10 rue Fleuriau,
17000 La Rochelle
Tel : 05 46 46 41 et 46 46 50
musee.nouveau-monde@ville-larochelle.fr
Translated with www.DeepL.com/Translator
