The Palais Garnier has its phantom (of the Opera), the Notre Dame has its hunchback—and the Louvre has Belphégor, seen here in the 1927 movie adaptation. Watch it take out its knife (image 3).
I had to think of this nightmare when I visited the museum a few years ago. Darkened museums—empty museums—are unnerving, it’s what your soul looks like when you’re depressed. It’s as if everyone lives in distant paintings around you and you’re the only human on Earth. The only voices you hear are echoes.
(I wonder though if Belphégor inspired the black-clad antagonist in the Carl Barks story, “The Phantom of the Notre Duck’.)
