Learn Hardcore French: Non seulement cette galerie soutient les jeunes artistes, mais elle propose aussi des ateliers gratuits. - Not only does this gallery support young artists, but it also offers free workshops.

Non seulement cette galerie soutient les jeunes artistes, mais elle propose aussi des ateliers gratuits.
→ Not only does this gallery support young artists, but it also offers free workshops.

Key points:

You present two positive facts and emphasize that the second one is in addition to the first.
You usually keep parallel structure:
- Non seulement
  - clause 1
- mais (aussi)
  - clause 2
Aussi can appear right after mais (mais aussi elle propose…) or just before the verb (mais elle propose aussi…), but non seulement … mais aussi is the most common “bundle” learners memorize as one unit.

Why is it cette galerie and not ce galerie?

Because galerie is a feminine noun, so it takes the feminine demonstrative adjective.

French demonstrative adjectives:

ce
- masculine singular noun: ce musée
cet
- masculine singular noun starting with vowel / mute h: cet artiste
cette
- feminine singular noun: cette galerie, cette école
ces
- any plural noun: ces galeries, ces artistes

Since galerie is feminine singular, the correct form is cette galerie = “this/that gallery.”

Why is it soutient and not supporte? Don’t both mean “to support”?

In this context, soutenir is the correct verb. Supporter is a false friend.

soutenir = to support in the sense of:
- helping, promoting, backing, funding
  - Cette galerie soutient les jeunes artistes.
    This gallery supports young artists (helps them, promotes them).
  - Le gouvernement soutient ce projet.
    The government supports this project.
supporter usually means:
- to tolerate, to put up with:
  - Je ne peux pas le supporter.
    I can’t stand him.
- or to support a team (as a fan):
  - Je supporte l’équipe de France.

So using supporter here (Cette galerie supporte les jeunes artistes) would sound wrong to a native speaker. For institutional or financial support, you almost always use soutenir.

Why is it les jeunes artistes and not des jeunes artistes?

In French, when you talk about a group in general, you often use the definite article (le, la, les), where English uses no article.

Cette galerie soutient les jeunes artistes.
→ This gallery supports young artists (young artists in general).

If you said:

Cette galerie soutient des jeunes artistes.
this would suggest “some young artists”, more specific or limited in number, not necessarily the whole category.

So:

les jeunes artistes = young artists as a category
des jeunes artistes = some young artists, an unspecified subset

In your sentence, the idea is that the gallery is known for supporting young artists in general, so les is natural.

Why does jeunes come before artistes? Can it come after?

Most French adjectives come after the noun, but some frequently appear before it. A common rule for many of these is the BANGS group (Beauty, Age, Number, Goodness, Size).

jeune expresses age, so it commonly goes before:
- un jeune artiste
- les jeunes auteurs

You can sometimes put jeune after the noun:

les artistes jeunes
But:
les jeunes artistes is the neutral, usual way to say “young artists.”
les artistes jeunes can sound more contrastive or descriptive, like “the artists who happen to be young,” rather than the standard label young artists.

So les jeunes artistes is the idiomatic default.

What tense and person are soutient and propose here?

Both soutient and propose are in the present indicative, 3rd person singular.

soutenir (to support) – irregular:
- je soutiens
- tu soutiens
- il/elle/on soutient
- nous soutenons
- vous soutenez
- ils/elles soutiennent
proposer (to offer / to propose) – regular -er verb:
- je propose
- tu proposes
- il/elle/on propose
- nous proposons
- vous proposez
- ils/elles proposent

Subjects in the sentence:

cette galerie soutient… → elle (the gallery) = 3rd person singular
elle propose… → also 3rd person singular

Hence soutient and propose.

Could we drop elle and just say … mais propose aussi des ateliers gratuits?

In standard French, you cannot drop the subject pronoun the way you sometimes can in other languages. You need elle:

… mais elle propose aussi des ateliers gratuits. ✅
… mais propose aussi des ateliers gratuits. ❌ (sounds incomplete/wrong in neutral French)

You can omit the subject only in very specific, often written or poetic contexts (headlines, notes, recipes, etc.), but in a normal sentence like this, the subject pronoun is obligatory, even if it is the same subject as in the previous clause.

Where can aussi go in this sentence? Does the position change the meaning?

In your sentence:

… mais elle propose aussi des ateliers gratuits.

This means:

The gallery not only supports young artists, but in addition, it offers free workshops.

Possible placements and nuances:

Elle propose aussi des ateliers gratuits.
Neutral, common: “She/It also offers free workshops.”
Elle propose des ateliers gratuits aussi.
More spoken, can emphasize workshops as being “also” free, depending on intonation.
With non seulement … mais aussi, you normally keep aussi close to mais or before the verb:
- Non seulement …, mais elle propose aussi des ateliers gratuits. ✅
- Non seulement …, mais aussi elle propose des ateliers gratuits. (possible, but less natural)
- Non seulement …, mais elle aussi propose des ateliers gratuits.
  → Now aussi stresses elle (“she too offers workshops,” in contrast to someone else).

So yes, the placement of aussi can shift what is being emphasized (the subject, the verb, or the object), even if the basic idea “also” stays the same.

What exactly does proposer mean here? Why not offrir or organiser?

In this sentence, proposer means roughly “to offer / to make available / to put on”:

Cette galerie propose des ateliers gratuits.
→ This gallery offers free workshops.

Nuances compared to other verbs:

proposer
- to offer or make something available, often as part of a program or range of services.
- It doesn’t automatically mean it’s free; that’s clarified by gratuits.
- Common with services:
  - proposer des activités, proposer un menu, proposer une exposition
offrir
- to give as a gift, or to offer something for free:
  - La galerie offre des ateliers gratuits.
    The gallery offers free workshops (as a gift, free of charge).
- Stronger sense of generosity.
organiser
- to set up / arrange / run something, focusing on the logistics:
  - La galerie organise des ateliers.
    The gallery organizes workshops.

Your sentence wants to highlight that the gallery includes free workshops in what it offers, not just that it arranges them technically or gives them as a gift, so proposer is very natural.

Why is it des ateliers gratuits and not de ateliers gratuits or des gratuits ateliers?

des vs de
- des is the normal indefinite plural article:
  - des ateliers = workshops / some workshops
- There is a rule that des becomes de before an adjective placed before the noun:
  - de beaux ateliers (not des beaux ateliers)
- But in your sentence, the adjective gratuits comes after the noun:
  - des ateliers gratuits
    → correct; des stays des.
So de ateliers gratuits is wrong; the correct form is des ateliers gratuits.
Why not des gratuits ateliers?
Because most adjectives in French follow the noun. Gratuit is normally post‑nominal:
- des ateliers gratuits ✅
- des gratuits ateliers ❌ (ungrammatical / very odd)

So: des ateliers gratuits is the only normal version here.

Why does gratuits end in -s? What is it agreeing with?

Gratuits is the plural masculine form of the adjective gratuit.

Agreement rules:

It must agree in gender and number with the noun it modifies.
Noun: ateliers
- un atelier → masculine singular
- des ateliers → masculine plural

So the adjective forms are:

masculine singular: gratuit → un atelier gratuit
masculine plural: gratuits → des ateliers gratuits
feminine singular: gratuite → une entrée gratuite
feminine plural: gratuites → des entrées gratuites

Here, ateliers is masculine plural, so the adjective must be gratuits.

Does starting with Non seulement require a special word order or inversion, like soutient-elle?

With non seulement at the start, you can use inversion in more formal or literary French, but you don’t have to. Both are possible:

Neutral, everyday style (your sentence):
- Non seulement cette galerie soutient les jeunes artistes, mais elle propose aussi des ateliers gratuits. ✅
  → normal subject–verb order in both clauses.
More formal / emphatic variant with inversion in the first clause:
- Non seulement cette galerie soutient‑elle les jeunes artistes, mais elle propose aussi des ateliers gratuits.
  → sounds more written, rhetorical, or formal.

Key idea:

In spoken and informal written French, the version without inversion (your original) is perfectly correct and most common.
Inversion after non seulement is an option for stylistic emphasis, not an obligation in modern everyday usage.