Text in French. A selection of objects from French public collections. The mapping of our aesthetic admirations changed considerably during the 20th century. Not only have the creations of earlier times been re-evaluated by artists and scholars, but new territories which only marginally belong to the sphere of the beautiful were discovered or annexed by the adventurous eye of the time. This repertory, enlarged in comparison with previous centuries, has obviously had a dramatic effect on creation itself, since artists suddenly have at their disposal a set of possibilities, concepts and forms much larger than their predecessors. Many of the masterpieces thus revealed have traced an exceptional trail in the history of thought and modern emotion. It is these masterpieces related to the French intellectual situation, invented by the twentieth century, that construct the history of the modern eye