Legion of
Honor
The California Palace of Legion of Honor is the
fine art museum located in San Francisco, California and used
for the name of the collection and the structure that houses it.
It was the gift of Alma de Bretteville Spreckels, the wife of
sugar king and thoroughbred racehorse owner/breeder, Adolph B.
Spreckels and is a three-quarters replica of the Palais de la
Legion d'Honneur, that is known as the Hotel de Salm in Paris,
France, that was finished in 1924. It sits on a raised hill in
Lincoln Park, in the northwest area of the city, with
outstanding views of the Golden Gate Bridge, and the majority of
the park sits on the site of a potter's field named, the Golden
Gate Cemetery that the city had purchased in 1867. Its
magnificent collections cover over 6000 years of ancient and
European artworks and contains the Achenbach Foundation for
Graphic Arts in a neoclassical structure that looks out over
Lincoln Park and the Golden Gate Bridge. Its galleries are
divided into ancient art, European art and the foundation with
highlights including; Waterlillies by Claude Monet from 194, St.
Francis Venerating the Crucifix by El Greco from 1595, the Grand
Canal by Claude Monet from 1908, St. John the Baptist by El
Greco from 1600, the Kiss by Auguste Rodin from 1884, The
Tribute Money by Peter Paul Rubens from 1612, Trotting Horse by
Edgar Degas from 1881 and the Age of Bronze by Auguste Rodin
from 1875. Other famous artists included are; Braque, Picasso,
Francois Boucher, Gottfried Helnwein, Rembrandt, Gainsborough,
Robert Crumb, David, Degas, Renoir, Pissarro, Cezanne, Seurat
and others.
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