Description
The Carthusian monastery is a collection of buildings from different periods, typical of French Flanders. When the Carthusian monks settled in Douai in 1662, they acquired the Abancourt (1559) and Montmorency (1608) hotels, to which they added a small cloister, a refectory, a chapter house, a large cloister and a classical-style church completed in 1722. During the 19th century, the large cloister and the monks’ cells were destroyed. Acquired by the city in 1951, the collections of the town’s former museum, destroyed in 1944, were installed here. The museum displays a relief map of the city dating from 1710, as well as works of Flemish primitive art characteristic of the polyptychs (typically altarpieces) of Bellegambe and Van Scorel and art movements from the 15th to the 20th century, in particular a sculpture by Buren, ‘La Cabane Rouge aux miroirs dans le cloître’.
