The Stock Exchange About Eternity

Discovering Paris' new contemporary art gallery, the Bourse de Commerce — Pinault Collection.

The Bourse de Commerce, as seen from the outside (Photo by William Sidnam)

It’s not every day you get to visit a stock exchange.

But as I shivered away outside the Bourse de Commerce in the 1st arrondissement of Paris, that was precisely what I had in mind.

It was the first Saturday of the month and the Bourse de Commerce was putting on its monthly visite nocturne — a nighttime visit when the gallery opens to the public. So when I arrived outside the Bourse just after 5pm, I was met with a queue that stretched a good 300 metres down the curved side of building.

It just so happens that whenever there’s a free expo in Paris, people make sure they make the most of them. But as the museum would only allow a certain number of visitors inside it at any one time, everyone in the queue would have to wait until a sufficient number had left the building.

As I stood in the queue wondering whether or not I was meant to have booked a ticket, the cold grey sky grew darker and darker. Daylight saving time had just finished a few weeks earlier, and night…