Art galleries

Take in the Riviera’s contemporary galleries and smaller independent spaces, where a day of looking can easily turn into a discovery or follow in the footsteps of the great masters that hark from this region such as Picasso, Matisse, Renoir, Chagall, Bonnard, Signac, Derain and Braque. The Annonciade Museum in Saint-Tropez (30mins) is arguably the best museum for understanding why these artists were so influenced by the extraordinary light and how it influenced and changed French painting. The Musee Picasso in Antibes (1hr) not only houses one of the finest collections of Picasso's work anywhere in the world, but it is also in the very building in which he created the works. The Fondation Maeght in Saint-Paul-de-Vence (1hr 20mins) is perhaps one of finest places to view more than 13,000 masterpieces and finally Nice, the home of Matisse and the Matisse Museum which covers the full breadth of his work from his arrival in 1917 until his death in 1954.