Taking its title from Pierre Michon’s 1984 book—which brought together eight portraits of strangers from which he wove his own biography—the exhibition, drawn from the Centre Pompidou’s collection, explores how art has embraced lives relegated to the margins of mainstream history and borne witness to their minute, intimate, or infamous contributions.

In the heart of the Panthéon’s nave—a monument dedicated to the nation’s great men and women—“Vies minuscules” thus presents some thirty artists and spans more than a century of artistic creation, from František Kupka to Jumana Manna.