Musee Matisse Nice

The Musée Matisse sits in a gorgeous 17th-century terracotta villa surrounded by olive trees in Cimiez, housing the world's largest Matisse collection. You'll see 68 paintings, 236 drawings, and crucially, his legendary paper cut-outs including Jazz (1947) and the massive Oceanie (1946). The chronological layout traces his evolution from dark early works through his Fauve period to those luminous cut-outs he created when arthritis forced him to stop painting.

The villa itself feels intimate, like wandering through Matisse's personal archive rather than a formal museum. The cut-outs on the upper floors are revelatory: seeing them life-size makes you understand why they revolutionized modern art in ways no reproduction can capture. The rooms flow naturally, and you're never fighting crowds like at the Picasso Museum. The terracotta walls and Mediterranean light streaming through windows create the perfect backdrop for his work.

At €10, it's excellent value, but most people rush through in 45 minutes and miss the point entirely. Spend at least 90 minutes, especially upstairs with the cut-outs. Skip the ground floor gift shop browsing and head straight to the first floor chronological displays. The archaeological site next door is free and worth 20 minutes if you're not museum-ed out. Closed Mondays, and the bus ride up (lines 15 or 17 from Place Masséna) takes 20 minutes but saves the steep walk.