Académie de la Grande Chaumière

What it is

Academie de la Grande Chaumiere is an art school founded in 1904 by the Catalan painter Claudio Castelucho on the street of the same name in Montparnasse, near the older Academie Colarossi, and it became a defining institution of the School of Paris movement.

From 1909 it was directed jointly by painters Martha Stettler, Alice Dannenberg and Lucien Simon, who ran it deliberately without the strict rules of the official Ecole des Beaux-Arts, offering low fees and, by reputation, nothing more than a model and heated space in winter — a model that suited the working artists who gathered in Montparnasse in the early twentieth century.

The Charpentier family acquired the school in 1957 and it continued under its original name and teaching model. In July 2025 the building's owner moved to close the school and convert the site to a commercial project, drawing criticism from French art-heritage groups; the outcome of that dispute was not independently confirmed at the time of writing, and a visitor should check the school's current status before planning to attend a session.

It sits in the same few Montparnasse streets as the Academie Colarossi it was founded near, part of a cluster of independent studio schools that let working artists — rather than only enrolled academy students — pay by the session to draw or paint from a live model, a structure that suited the international community of painters and sculptors who settled in Montparnasse in the early twentieth century precisely because the official Ecole des Beaux-Arts route was closed to many of them, including most women and most foreigners.

Checked 2026-08-24 · Source

What's inside

Two studio spaces historically ran side by side: one for long-pose painting and drawing, the other for short-pose sketching from a live model, both open to working artists and students rather than to sightseers browsing an exhibition.

The school produced or hosted major figures of the School of Paris across the twentieth century, and its low-cost, no-curriculum model — a room, a stove and a model, nothing else provided — is itself the thing visitors come to see: a working survival of Montparnasse's early-twentieth-century artist quarter rather than a restored period room.

Antoine Bourdelle, the sculptor whose own studio-museum sits a short walk away in the same district, taught and lectured at the Academie during its early decades, and a published collection of his courses and lessons there, covering 1909 to 1929, documents the teaching style in more detail than the school's own surviving records do.

Checked 2026-08-24 · Source

How long to spend

Not recorded independently of attending an actual class or drop-in session, since there is no exhibition space to walk through — this is a working school, and the building is not open for a general sightseeing visit.

A historical drop-in life-drawing session, where one ran, typically lasted two to three hours by the model's pose schedule; that pattern is not confirmed as still in effect given the 2025 closure dispute.

Checked 2026-08-24 · Source

Season and crowds

Not recorded. Given the reported 2025 closure dispute, a visitor should confirm directly, before travelling, whether the school is currently teaching and admitting walk-in sessions at all.

Montparnasse's other studio landmarks nearby, including the former Academie Colarossi site, are worth combining with any visit here regardless of this particular school's schedule.

Checked 2026-08-24 · Source

Tickets

Not recorded. Historically the school ran affordable drop-in life-drawing sessions alongside enrolled courses, but no current published fee could be confirmed from an operator source at the time of writing, and the school's 2025 closure dispute makes any older published price unreliable.

Checked 2026-08-24 · Source

Getting there

14 Rue de la Grande Chaumiere, 6th arrondissement, in the Montparnasse district, a short walk from the Vavin junction of Boulevard Raspail and Boulevard Montparnasse.

Vavin station, line 4, is the closest stop, and Montparnasse-Bienvenue, lines 4, 6, 12 and 13, reaches it within a ten-minute walk.

Checked 2026-08-24 · Source

What to watch out for

As of the reported 2025 closure dispute, whether the school is still operating, still teaching, or has changed use entirely is not confirmed here — verify directly before visiting rather than relying on an older listing.

This is a working art school building, not a museum: there is no general public entry outside an actual class.

Checked 2026-08-24 · Source

Photography

Not recorded. The building's exterior on Rue de la Grande Chaumiere can be photographed from the street like any Montparnasse facade; no interior photography policy is published, and interior access exists only for enrolled students and session attendees in any case.

Checked 2026-08-24 · Source

Where it is

• 2 hours

  1 min walk · Paris 6e Arrondissement

  MK2 Parnasse

  • Notable
  • Entertainment venue
• 1 hour

  1 min walk · Paris 6e Arrondissement

  Monument to Balzac

  • High
  • Art and culture venue
• 1 hour

  2 min walk · Paris 6e Arrondissement

  Café de la Rotonde

  • High
  • Restaurant or café

External links

• Official site
• +33 1 43 26 13 72
• View on Wikidata