The Louvre was a rich and varied source of inspiration for the painters of the late 19th and early 20th centuries—a place of culture and controversy, of stimulation and emulation. At the Louvre with the Masters studies the relationships of five famous painters—Courbet, Degas, Cézanne, Matisse, and Picasso—with their illustrious predecessors, and uses their writings, sketches, paintings, and studio contents to demonstrate that their modernity had its roots within the Louvre's walls.