Musée Fabre

This fine arts museum grew from the gift of a local painter's collection and now ranks among the leading galleries of southern France. Its rooms trace European painting from the Renaissance to the modern age, with strong holdings of Dutch, Spanish and French masters. A wing is devoted to the Montpellier-born painter Frédéric Bazille. A distinctive detail is the collection assembled around the patron Alfred Bruyas, whose portrait by Courbet and the painting of their meeting on a country road anchor a room of Realist works.