Museums around the world spend millions of dollars to ensure lighting, architecture, interiors and layout work together to bring out the best in their collections. In Beijing, where the exhibition started its China tour, the paintings were given a regal, solemn, almost cold treatment.

Clearly, the National Museum's curators wanted to emphasise the paintings' status as national treasures. They were shown in cavernous dark rooms, with each piece surrounded by red ropes and armed guards.

The need for security was obvious: crowds gathered before each piece, pushing, shoving and squinting. Perhaps they were more aggressive than usual because the dim rooms and the distance they were kept from the paintings conspired to make the details in smaller works hard to see.

The paintings were also lit with bright overhead spotlights - perhaps in an attempt to make them seem dramatic. It might have worked for black and white calligraphy. But the subtle beauty of the Impressionists can't be forced, and the masterly interpretations of sunlight were lost under the artificial glare.

The Hong Kong Museum of Art, while not exactly the d'Orsay, has given the works a softer treatment. The red ropes and armed guards have been replaced by invisible sensors, and it's possible to get close to the paintings before setting them off.

As well, the museum is laid out to allow viewers to walk through several smaller, adjoining rooms, giving the exhibition a more natural, welcoming feel. Upstairs, there are side exhibitions and educational displays. Importantly, the lights are on.

The first work that greets you in Hong Kong is Manet's The Fifer (1866), which has been used for most of the exhibition's publicity. It's only in person, however, that one can appreciate its detail, clarity and the impact of its size. It's also interesting to trace Manet's progression through the exhibition's roughly chronological layout, and to compare his formally dressed fifer with his rough The Beer Serving Girl (1879).

The show starts with the darker, more classical works of early Impressionism: Boudin's moody Beach Scene, Trouville (1864), Sisley's View of Montmartre from the Cite des Fleurs (1869) with its depressing leafless saplings, and Bazille's detailed, intensely coloured Black Woman with Peonies (1870).

Then come the big names, although there are surprises. Those who equate Degas with ballet dancers may be interested to see his small but striking Head of a Young Woman (1867) and his top-hatted men at the stock exchange - works that share the intensity and sense of intimacy of his better-known ballerinas.

And it's only in person that you realise how ridiculous the famed In a Cafe, the Absinthe Drinker is, with the drugged lady in her frilly hat, oblivious to the looming figure beside her.

A similar case can be made for Monet. The exhibition features examples of his stunning studies of light on cathedrals and lilies, but it also includes the two- metre vision of classical, corsetted beauty that is Madame Gaudibert (1868), a huge contrast to the wild, almost abstract red, white and blue waving flags in Rue Montogueil, Paris, Celebration of 30 June 1878.

Importantly, the Hong Kong exhibit allows the Impressionists' use and exploration of light to come through, from the spectacular spectrum of dappled sunlight in Renoir's Woman, Torso in the Sun (1875) to the ingenious way the pointillist Pissarro used cotton-candy pink, sunflower yellow and lavender to paint clear, bright sunrises and sunsets in The House of Folly at Eragny (1885).

Although the publicity has focused on the Musee D'Orsay pieces, there are works from private collections and half a dozen lesser known French museums. All of which makes the Impressionist exhibition in China unique - and one that's not to be missed.

Impressionism: Treasures from the National Collection from France, Hong Kong Museum of Art, Salisbury Rd, TST. Ends April 10.