The Metropolitan Museum of Art: SCHEDULE OF EXHIBITIONS JANUARY - DECEMBER 2010
NEW EXHIBITIONS
The Art of Illumination: The Limbourg Brothers and the Belles Heures of Jean de France,
Duc de Berry
March 2–June 13, 2010
The Belles Heures (1405-1408/9) of Jean de Berry, a treasure of The Cloisters collection, is one of the most celebrated and lavishly illustrated manuscripts to have survived from the late Middle Ages. Because it is currently unbound, all of the illuminated pages can be exhibited as individual leaves, a unique opportunity never to be repeated. The exhibition will elucidate the manuscript, its artists – the young Franco-Netherlandish Limbourg Brothers – and its patron, Jean de France, duc de Berry. A select group of precious objects from the same early-15th-century courtly milieu will place the manuscript in the context of the patronage of Jean de Berry and his royal family, the Valois.
The exhibition is made possible by The Andrew W. Mellon Foundation and the Michel David-Weill Fund.
The related publication is made possible by the Michel David-Weill Fund.
The Mourners: Medieval Tomb Sculptures from the Court of Burgundy
March 2–May 23, 2010
The renovation of the Musée des Beaux-Arts in Dijon provides an opportunity for the unprecedented loan of the alabaster mourner figures from the tomb of John the Fearless, Duke of Burgundy, and his wife, Margaret of Bavaria. Each of the 38 statuettes is approximately 40 centimeters (16 inches) high. They were carved by Jean de La Huerta and Antoine Le Moiturier between 1443 and 1456 for the ducal tomb originally in the church of Champmol. They follow the precedent of the mourner figures carved by Claus Sluter and colleagues for the tomb of Duke Philip the Bold (1342-1404). The tombs are celebrated as among the most sumptuous and innovative of the late Middle Ages. The primary innovation was the space given to the figures of the grieving mourners on the base of the tomb, who seem to pass through the real arcades of a cloister. The installation at the Metropolitan will be supplemented by related works from the Museum's collection, including the monumental Enthroned Virgin from the convent at Poligny (established by John the Fearless and Margaret of Bavaria) that was carved by Claus de Werve. The exhibition was organized by the Dallas Museum of Art and the Musée des Beaux Arts de Dijon, under the auspices of FRAME (French Regional and American Museum Exchange). The exhibition is supported by a leadership gift from the Iris and B. Gerald Cantor Foundation. Additional support is provided by The Florence Gould Foundation, the Eugene McDermott Foundation, Connie Goodyear Baron, and Boucheron. Major corporate support is provided by Bank of the West – Member BNP Paribas Group.
The exhibition is supported by an indemnity from the Federal Council on the Arts and the Humanities.
Accompanied by a catalogue.
Tutankhamun's Funeral
March 16, 2010 – September 6, 2010
Buried near his tomb in around 1327 B.C., remains from the mummification and funeral of the ancient Egyptian pharaoh Tutankhamun were unearthed in 1907 by the American businessman and excavator Theodore M. Davis, who in 1909 donated the objects to the Metropolitan Museum. This exhibition will consist of the most important pieces from the Davis find. On display will be pottery vessels from the funeral meal, linen sheets and bandages, bags of natron and sawdust from the embalming process, and some fine linen head covers worn by the embalmers. Highlights will be the miraculously well-preserved collars of real flowers that must have been intended to adorn the mummy, but were not used. A sculpted head of the youthful Tutankhamun, facsimile paintings representing contemporary funerary rituals, and photographs by Harry Burton will round out this intimate glimpse into what went on at the king's funeral. The exhibition is made possible by the Gail and Parker Gilbert Fund.
The catalogue is made possible by The Friends of Isis, Friends of the Department of Egyptian Art, The Metropolitan Museum of Art.
Side by Side: Oberlin's Masterworks at the Met
March 16 – August 29, 2010
Founded in 1917, the Allen Memorial Art Museum at Oberlin College is one of the finest college or university collections in the United States, serving as an invaluable educational resource for aspiring art scholars and artists. While the museum is closed in 2010 for renovations, 20 of their masterpieces—19 paintings and one sculpture—will be on view at The Metropolitan Museum of Art for five months. These will include the great Ter Brugghen painting Saint Sebastian Tended by Saint Irene (one of the most important Northern Baroque paintings in the U.S.), Cézanne's Viaduct at l'Estaque, Kirchner's Self-Portrait as a Soldier, and a striking Kirchner sculpture. Each of these works will be integrated into the Metropolitan Museum's great collection, creating new, provocative juxtapositions.
Vienna Circa 1780: An Imperial Silver Service Rediscovered
April 13–November 7, 2010
Following the acquisition in 2002 of two Viennese silver wine coolers from the Sachsen-Teschen Service, most of the set's surviving parts were discovered in a French private collection. This superb ensemble was last displayed at the beginning of the 20th century. Wine coolers, tureens, cloches, candelabra, candlesticks, dozens of plates, porcelain-mounted cutlery, and other kinds of tableware, totaling over 350 items, represent the splendor of royal dining during the ancien régime. It was made for Duke Albert Casimir of Sachsen-Teschen (1738-1822) and his consort, Archduchess Maria Christina of Austria (1742-1798), daughter of Empress Maria Theresa, by the Imperial court goldsmith Ignaz Josef Würth. The Sachsen-Teschen Silver Service, an embodiment of Viennese neo-classicism, will be shown in the context of contemporary silver from other countries.
The exhibition is made possible by the Anna-Maria and Stephen Kellen Foundation.
Picasso in The Metropolitan Museum of Art
April 27–August 1, 2010
This landmark exhibition is the first to focus exclusively on works by Pablo Picasso (1881–1973) in the Museum's collection. It features 250 works, including the Museum's complete holdings of paintings, drawings, sculptures, and ceramics by Picasso—never before seen in their entirety—as well as a selection of the artist's prints. The Museum's collection reflects the full breadth of the artist's multi-sided genius as it asserted itself over the course of his long and influential career. Notable for its remarkable constellation of early figure paintings, which include the commanding At the Lapin Agile (1905) and the iconic portrait of Gertrude Stein (1906), the Museum's collection also stands apart for its exceptional cache of drawings, which, despite their importance and number, remains relatively little known. The key subjects that variously sustained Picasso's interest—the pensive harlequins of his Blue and Rose periods, the faceted figures and tabletop still lifes of his cubist years, the monumental heads and classicizing bathers of the 1920s, the raging bulls and dreaming nudes of the 1930s, and the rakish cavaliers and musketeers of his final years— are amply represented by works ranging in date from a dashing self-portrait of 1900 (Self-Portrait "Yo") to the fanciful Standing Nude and Seated Musketeer painted nearly 70 years later.
The exhibition and the catalogue are made possible by the Iris and B. Gerald Cantor Foundation.
Doug + Mike Starn on the Roof: Big Bambú
April 27–October 31, 2010 (weather permitting)
American artists Mike and Doug Starn (born 1961) have been invited by The Metropolitan Museum of Art to create a site-specific installation for The Iris and B. Gerald Cantor Roof Garden, opening to the public on April 27. The identical twin brothers will present Big Bambú, a monumental bamboo structure ultimately measuring 100 feet long by 50 feet wide by 50 feet high in the form of a cresting wave that will bridge realms of sculpture, architecture, and performance. Visitors are meant to witness the creation and evolving incarnations of Big Bambú as it is constructed throughout the spring, summer, and fall by the artists and a team of rock climbers. Set against Central Park and its urban backdrop, Doug + Mike Starn on the Roof: Big Bambú will suggest the complexity and energy of an ever-changing living organism. It will comprise the 13th consecutive single-artist installation on the Cantor Roof Garden. The exhibition is made possible by Bloomberg.
Additional support is provided by Cynthia Hazen Polsky and Leon B. Polsky.
The exhibition is also made possible in part by the Jane and Robert Carroll Fund. Press preview:
American Woman: Fashioning a National Identity
May 5–August 15, 2010
American Woman: Fashioning a National Identity, is the first Costume Institute exhibition drawn from the newly established Brooklyn Museum Costume Collection at the Met. It will explore developing perceptions of the modern American woman from 1890 to 1940, and how they have affected the way American women are seen today. Focusing on archetypes of American femininity through dress, the exhibition will reveal how the American woman initiated style revolutions that mirrored her social, political, and sexual emancipation.
The exhibition is made possible by Gap.
Additional support is provided by Condé Nast.
An Italian Journey: Drawings from the Tobey Collection, Correggio to Tiepolo
May 12–August 15, 2010
Over the past 20 years, Julie and David Tobey have assembled one of the preeminent collections of Italian Old Master drawings in private hands. Ranging across the 16th, 17th, and 18th centuries, this exhibition, consisting of approximately 70 drawings, will cover all the principal centers of Italian art—Florence, Rome, Naples, Bologna, Parma, Venice, Genoa, Milan—and feature masterpieces by a distinguished roster of great draftsmen, among them Correggio, Bernini, Guercino, Guido Reni, Canaletto, and Tiepolo. Impressive in its variety, the gamut of subject matter will include figures studies, historical and mythological narratives, landscapes, vedute, botanical drawings, motifs copied from or inspired by classical antiquity, and designs for painted compositions.
Accompanied by a catalogue.
UPCOMING EXHIBITIONS
From Xanadu to Dadu: The World of Khubilai Khan
September 28, 2010–January 2, 2011
This exhibition will cover the period from 1215, the year of Khubilai's birth, to 1368, the year of the fall of the Yuan dynasty in China founded by Khubilai Khan, and will feature every art form, including paintings, sculpture, gold and silver, textiles, ceramics, lacquer, and other decorative arts, religious and secular. The exhibition will highlight new art forms and styles generated in China as a result of the unification of China under the Yuan dynasty and the massive influx of craftsmen from all over the vast Mongol empire – with reverberations in Italian art of the 14th century. The exhibition is made possible in part by the E. Rhodes and Leona B. Carpenter Foundation, The Dillon Fund, and the National Endowment for the Arts.
The Roman Mosaic from Lod, Israel
September 28, 2010–April 3, 2011
First discovered in 1996 during construction on the Jerusalem-Tel Aviv highway in Lod (formerly Lydda), Israel, this large and impressive mosaic floor has only recently been uncovered and was displayed briefly in situ to the public in Israel during the summer of 2009. Believed to belong to a large house owned by a wealthy Roman in about A.D. 300, the mosaic's central square panel depicts various animals, birds, and fish in a lively and colorful manner. It has now been removed from the ground and will be first exhibited to the general public here at the Metropolitan Museum. The exhibition is made possible by Diane Carol Brandt in memory of Ruth and Benjamin Brandt.
Man, Myth, and Sensual Pleasures: Jan Gossart's Renaissance
October 6, 2010—January 17, 2011
Jan Gossart is the Netherlandish artist most often credited with successfully assimilating Italian Renaissance style into northern European art of the early 16th century. He was among the first northern artists to travel to Rome to make copies after antique sculpture, and to introduce historical and mythological subjects with erotic nude figures into the mainstream of Netherlandish painting. Gossart is the pivotal figure who changed the course of Netherlandish art history from the Medieval craft tradition of its founder, Jan van Eyck, and charted new territory that eventually led to the great age of Rubens. This international loan exhibition will bring together Gossart's paintings, drawings, and prints, and place them in the context of the art and artists that influenced his transformation from Late Gothic Mannerism to the new Renaissance style.
Accompanied by a catalogue.
The exhibition is made possible in part by Hester Diamond.
Katrin Sigurdardottir at the Met
October 19, 2010 - March 6, 2011
Icelandic artist Katrin Sigurdardottir (b. 1967) will create an installation for the Museum's series of solo exhibitions featuring the work of contemporary artists at mid-career.
The Artistic Furniture of Charles Rohlfs
October 19, 2010—January 23, 2011
This is a small, scholarly focused exhibition of about 50 pieces of the distinctive "artistic furniture" and related objects produced by the workshop of Charles Rohlfs (1853-1936) in Buffalo, New York. His unusually inventive forms and imaginative carving combined many influences, from the abstract naturalism of Art Nouveau to the bold forms of the Arts and Crafts movement. The exhibition explores Rohlfs's work in the context of new research that reveals his success in Europe as well as in America, and traces his influence on other 20th-century furniture designers. The exhibition will draw from many public and private collections.
The exhibition was organized by the Milwaukee Art Museum, the Chipstone Foundation, and American Decorative Art 1900 Foundation.
John Baldessari: Pure Beauty
October 20, 2010—January 9, 2011
This is the first major U.S. exhibition in 20 years to survey the work of legendary American artist John Baldessari, widely renowned as a pioneer of conceptual art. Baldessari (b. 1931, National City, California) turned from an early career in painting toward photographic images that he combined with text, using the freeways, billboards, and strip malls of Southern California as his frequent sources. In his groundbreaking work of the late 1960s, he transferred snapshots of banal locales around his home town onto photo-sensitized canvases and hired a sign painter to label them with their locations or excerpts from how-to books on photography. Throughout the whole of his career, Baldessari's sharp insights into the conventions of art production, the nature of perception, and the relationship of language to mass-media imagery are tempered by a keen sense of humor. The exhibition brings together a full range of the artist's innovative work over five decades, from his early paintings and phototext works, his combined photographs, and the irregularly shaped and over-painted works of the 1990s, to his most recent production. A selection of his videos and artist's books will also be included.
The exhibition is made possible in part by The Daniel and Estrellita Brodsky Foundation.
The exhibition was organized by the Los Angeles County Museum of Art in association with Tate
Modern, London.
Haremhab, General and King of Egypt
November 10, 2010 – late spring/summer 2011
The exhibition examines the Metropolitan's well-known statue of Haremhab as a Scribe, focusing on the historical and art-historical significance of the statue and of its subject: a royal scribe, and general of the army under Tutankhamun, who eventually became king (18th Dynasty, ca.1323-1309 B.C.).
Stieglitz, Steichen, Strand
November 10, 2010—April 10, 2011
This exhibition features three giants of photography—Alfred Stieglitz (1864-1946), Edward Steichen (1879-1973), and Paul Strand (1890-1976)—whose works are some of the Metropolitan's greatest photographic treasures. The diverse and groundbreaking work of these artists will be revealed through a presentation of approximately 100 photographs, drawn entirely from the collection. Alfred Stieglitz, a photographer of supreme accomplishment as well as a passionate advocate for photography and modern art through his gallery "291" and his sumptuous journal Camera Work, laid the foundation of the Met's collection. He donated 22 of his own works in 1928—the first photographs to be acquired by the Museum as works of art—and more than 600 by other photographers, including Steichen and Strand, in later decades. Featured in the exhibition are portraits, city views, cloud studies by Stieglitz, as well as numerous images from his composite portrait of Georgia O'Keeffe, part of a group selected for the collection by O'Keeffe herself. Stieglitz's protégé and gallery collaborator, Edward Steichen, was the most talented exemplar of Photo-Secessionist ideas, with works such as his three large variant prints of The Flatiron and his moonlit photographs of Rodin's Balzac purposely rivaling the scale, color, and individuality of painting. By contrast, the final issue of Camera Work (1916) was devoted to the young Paul Strand, whose photographs from 1915 and 1916 treated three principal themes—movement in the city, abstractions, and street portraits—and pioneered a shift from the soft-focus Pictorialist aesthetic to the straight approach and graphic power of an emerging modernism.
CONTINUING EXHIBITIONS
Imperial Privilege: Vienna Porcelain of Du Paquier, 1718–44
Through March 21, 2010
The second porcelain factory in Europe able to make true porcelain in the manner of the Chinese was established in Vienna in 1718. Founded by Claudius Innocentius du Paquier, the small porcelain enterprise developed a highly distinctive style that remained Baroque in inspiration throughout the history of the factory, which was taken over by the state in 1744. Du Paquier produced a range of tablewares, decorative vases, and small-scale sculpture that found great popularity with the Hapsburg court and the Austrian nobility. This exhibition charts the history of the development of the Du Paquier factory, setting its production within the historic and cultural context of Vienna in the first half of the 18th century. The porcelain featured is drawn from both the Metropolitan Museum and the premier private collection of this material. The exhibition is made possible by Eloise W. Martin and the Melinda and Paul Sullivan Foundation for the Decorative Arts.
Accompanied by a publication.
The Drawings of Bronzino
Through April 18, 2010
This exhibition is the first ever dedicated to Agnolo Bronzino (1503-1572) and presents nearly all the known drawings by this leading Italian Mannerist artist, who worked primarily in Florence. A painter, draftsman, teacher, academician, and enormously witty poet, Bronzino became famous as the court artist to Duke Cosimo I de' Medici and his beautiful wife, Duchess Eleonora di Toledo. Drawing was for Bronzino a uniquely functional activity, and close-up examination of his studies on paper provides an intimate glimpse into his creative process. This exhibition contains 61 drawings from European and North American museums and private collections, many of which have never before been on public view.
The exhibition was organized by The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, in collaboration
with the Gabinetto Disegni e Stampe degli Uffizi and the Polo Museale Fiorentino, Florence.
The exhibition is made possible by the Gail and Parker Gilbert Fund.
Additional support is provided by Dinah Seiver and Thomas E. Foster.
The exhibition is supported by an indemnity from the Federal Council on the Arts and the
Humanities.
The catalogue is made possible by The Andrew W. Mellon Foundation.
Pablo Bronstein at the Met
Through April 18, 2010
For this exhibition, Pablo Bronstein (b. 1977) has created two new bodies of work addressing the nature of the Museum. Several large ink drawings portray a mythical history of the Metropolitan Museum, imagining the building under construction and giant works of art being transported or installed. In parallel, a series of smaller digital images, displayed on tables under glass, focus on a hypothetical future of the Museum. The exhibition is the sixth in an ongoing series highlighting the work of contemporary artists that has featured Tony Oursler, Kara Walker, Neo Rauch, Tara Donovan, and Raqib Shaw.
Playing with Pictures: The Art of Victorian Photocollage
Through May 9, 2010
In the 1860s and 1870s, long before the embrace of collage techniques by avant-garde artists of the early 20th century, aristocratic Victorian women were experimenting with photocollage. Whimsical and fantastical Victorian photocollages, created using a combination of watercolor drawings and cut-and-pasted photographs, reveal the educated minds as well as accomplished hands of their makers. The photocollages frequently debunked stuffy Victorian clichés with surreal, subversive, and funny images and subjects as varied as new theories of evolution, the changing role of photography, and the strict conventions of aristocratic society. With sharp wit and dramatic shifts of scale akin to those Alice experienced in Wonderland, these images stand the rather serious conventions of early photography on their heads. The exhibition features approximately 50 works from public and private collections.
The exhibition was organized by The Art Institute of Chicago.
The exhibition in New York is made possible by The Hite Foundation in memory of Sybil E. Hite.
Accompanied by a catalogue.
The Young Archer Attributed to Michelangelo
Opened November 3, 2009
The Metropolitan Museum of Art is presenting a marble sculpture Young Archer, attributed to Michelangelo Buonarroti (Florence 1475- Rome 1564), in its Vélez Blanco Patio for ten years as part of a special loan from the French Republic, Ministry of Foreign and European Affairs. The Young Archer first entered the United States after it was obtained by architect Stanford White for the Manhattan residence of Mr. and Mrs. Payne Whitney at 972 Fifth Avenue. The fragmentary marble figure of a nude youth, which is missing arms and lower legs, remained in the Fifth Avenue mansion for decades after it became the Cultural Services office of the French Embassy. Displayed in the entrance hall above a fountain, the sculpture was visible from the sidewalk, but remained unremarked until 1990 when it was observed by Metropolitan Museum Curator James David Draper, the first scholar to publish its whereabouts.
In 1997 New York University professor Kathleen Weil-Garris Brandt's attribution of the marble to the young Michelangelo caused a stir, but was championed by Draper and many scholars, while others disagreed. The exhibition includes illustrated text panels outlining the Young Archer's history and its likely place early in the career of Michelangelo, while indicating various schools of thought so that viewers can make up their minds accordingly.
UPCOMING & CONTINUING INSTALLATIONS
Celebration: The Birthday in Chinese Art
February 27–August 15, 2010
Birthday celebrations and concomitant themes of longevity are pervasive in Chinese art of the Ming and Qing dynasties. A recurring scene of a splendid reception at the residence of a wealthy family, represented in a lacquered screen, a set of embroidered hanging scrolls, and a porcelain vase, shows the 80th birthday gathering for the Tang-dynasty general Guo Ziyi, a popular figure of long life, wealth, and honor. Longevity is also encoded in peaches, cranes, immortals, and flora and fauna of many kinds, sometimes forming sophisticated visual word play expressing wishes of long life for the honoree. The exhibition will draw together works in many media from the Museum's collection to illuminate these auspicious themes.
Northern European Manuscript Illuminations from the Robert Lehman Collection
March 16–June 13, 2010
This installation features fourteen rare and important manuscript illuminations from the Museum's Robert Lehman Collection. Ranging in date from the 13th through the 16th century and representing high points of the German, French, and Netherlandish schools of illumination, the presentation includes examples by such highly regarded artists as Jean Fouquet (1420–1481), Simon Marmion (1425–1489), Simon Bening (1483-1561), and the an artist close to the Housebook Master.
Epic India: Scenes from the Ramayana
March 31–September 27, 2010
Among the themes most favored for Indian miniature painting are episodes from the great Indian epic, the Ramayama. This classic of early Indian literature is infused with mythology and the legendary exploits of the gods, but above all tells the story of Lord Vishnu in his earthly appearance as Rama, a divine-king revered as the embodiment of nobility and virtue. The mythology of Rama provides the subject matter for an important genre of Indian paintings, and a selection of such works will be exhibited here, along with sculptures and a newly acquired, spectacular painted cotton textile depicting a scene from the epic.
Hipsters, Hustlers, and Handball Players: Leon Levinstein's New York Photographs, 1950-1980
June 8–October 11, 2010
Leon Levinstein (American, 1910–1988), an unheralded master of street photography, is best known for his candid and unsentimental black-and-white figure studies made in New York City neighborhoods from Times Square and the Lower East Side to Coney Island. This exhibition, drawn exclusively from the Metropolitan's collection, will feature some 40 photographs that reflect the artist's fearless approach to the medium. Levinstein's graphic virtuosity—seen in raw, expressive gestures and seemingly monumental bodies—is balanced by his unusual compassion for his off-beat subjects from the demimonde.
Between Here and There: Dislocation and Displacement in Contemporary Photography
July 2, 2010–February 13, 2011
Themes of dislocation and displacement in contemporary photography are explored in this exhibition of works from the collection. Perambulations and digressions in photographic works from the 1960s and 1970s by Vito Acconci, Ed Ruscha, Richard Long, and On Kawara and a 1968 video by Bruce Nauman show how a work of art—cut loose from any specific medium or physical requirements—could take the form of a walk, a 20-foot–long book, or a rigorously nonsensical pattern of movements. After two decades of artists focusing on serial images and low-tech experimentation, the highly produced, singular photograph began to regain prominence in the 1980s. Works by Rineke Dijkstra and Thomas Struth evince a faith in photography's traditional powers of description to reflect upon a newly post-national, global existence, while Darren Almond and Doug Aitken examine perceptual and psychological disconnections that accompany the same seismic transformations. The exhibition also includes works by Lothar Baumgarten, Valie Export, Komar & Melamid, Igor and Svetlana Kopytiansky, Dennis Oppenheim, Gabriel Orozco, Robert Smithson, Anne Turyn, and Weng Fen.
Cinnabar: The Chinese Art of Carved Lacquer
Through February 21, 2010
Although lacquer is used in many Asian cultures, the art of carving lacquer is unique to China. In this technique, multiple layers (as many as 200) are applied onto a substructure in the shape of a box or some other container, and individually dried and carved to create lush geometric motifs, or lively representations of figures in landscapes and birds flying amidst flowers. This exhibition, which celebrates the Museum's collection, showcases approximately 50 examples of this art form. It features several newly acquired works, as well as an important, recently restored, 18th-century screen that is displayed for the first time.
Peaceful Conquerors: Jain Manuscript Painting
Through March 28, 2010
The art of the book in medieval India is closely associated with the Jain religious community, and illustrated palm-leaf manuscripts survive from around the 10th century, while those on paper appear after the 12th, when paper was introduced from Iran. The use of paper permitted larger compositions and a greater variety of decorative devices and borders. Significantly, however, the format of the palm- leaf manuscript was retained. By the end of the 14th century, deluxe manuscripts were produced on paper, brilliantly adorned with gold, silver, crimson, and a rich ultramarine derived from imported lapis lazuli. The patrons of the works were mainly Svetambara Jains, who considered the commissioning of illustrated books and their donation to Jain temple libraries to be an important merit-making activity. A selection of these exquisite manuscripts are on view, along with bronzes sculptures of Jinas and a ceremonial painted textile.
Arts of Korea Gallery
Through April 25, 2010
The Arts of Korea Gallery features an elegant, large-scale work entitled 25 Wishes by the well-known Korean-American artist Ik-joong Kang (b. 1960). Consisting of 25 subtly differentiated images of a porcelain moon jar, this multi-panel installation replicates, repeats, and transforms a familiar and iconic Korean art object from the Joseon period (1392-1910). The work also embodies layers of poignant associations from the artist's own life and engages the viewers to visualize their own reveries. 25 Wishes, on loan from the artist, is exhibited with the exquisite 18th-century Moon Jarthe from the Metropolitan's own collection. They are accompanied by related porcelains and other ceramics from the 15th through the 19th century, all drawn from the Museum's collection.
Richard Hamilton: Selected Prints from the Collection, 1970–2005
Through May 2, 2010
The internationally acclaimed British artist Richard Hamilton (b. 1922), one of the founders of Pop art in London, first studied printmaking as a teenager and continues his experiments today at the age of 87. This selection of some 26 works presents Hamilton's groundbreaking forays into a variety of print media, from traditional intaglio to digital techniques, as he explores subjects derived from portraiture, the history of art, and the work of Irish-born author James Joyce (1882–1941).
Five Thousand Years of Japanese Art: Treasures from the Packard Collection
Through June 6, 2010
In 1975, The Metropolitan Museum of Art acquired more than 400 works of Japanese art from collector Harry G. C. Packard (1914-1991), by gift and purchase. The daring acquisition instantly transformed the Museum into an institution boasting one of the preeminent collections of Japanese art in the Western world, with encyclopedic holdings from the Neolithic period through the 19th century. The exhibition celebrates the 35th anniversary of the acquisition of the Packard Collection, and showcases its particular strengths in archaeological artifacts, Buddhist iconographic scrolls, ceramics, screen paintings of the Momoyama and Edo periods (16th-19th centuries), and sculptures of the Heian and Kamakura periods (9th-14th centuries). A highlight of the exhibition is a pairing of masterpieces by Kano school master and his son: Old Plum, a set of sliding-door panels by the Kano Sansetsu (1589-1651) from the Packard Collection and One Hundred Boys, a pair of six-fold screens by Kano Einō (1631-97), acquired in 2009.
Surface Tension: Contemporary Photographs from the Collection
Through June 13, 2010
Photographs are often perceived as transparent windows onto a three-dimensional world. Yet photographs also have their own material presence as physical objects. Contemporary artists who exploit this apparent contradiction between photograph as window and photograph as object are featured in Surface Tension. The exhibition presents 30 works that play with the inherent tension between the flatness of the photograph and the often lifelike illusion of depth. Surface Tensionhighlights the ways in which artists use photographic and multi-media techniques to direct our attention to the physical surface of the photograph. Among the works featured are photographs that have been purposely scratched, burned, or painted on, as well as photograms made by placing objects directly on top of a sheet of photographic paper. The exhibition is drawn entirely from the permanent collection and features several recent acquisitions and other contemporary photographs never before shown at the Museum.
Contemporary Aboriginal Painting from Australia
Through June 13, 2010
Beginning in the remote desert community of Papunya in the early 1970s, Australia's contemporary Aboriginal painting has become the most celebrated contemporary art movement within Australia and has attained prominence within the international art world. This exhibition features works by both established and emerging artists from a selection of important art-producing centers in Australia's central desert and adjacent regions, such as Papunya, Yuendumu, Lajamanu, Balgo, Utopia, and Warmun, illustrating the diversity of imagery produced by contemporary painters as well as the underlying theme of dreaming (the beings and events of the Primordial creation period), which unites their dynamic compositions. The exhibition consists of loans from a private collection and represents the first presentation of contemporary Aboriginal art, arguably the most important current art movement in Oceania, at the Metropolitan.
The exhibition is made possible through the generosity of the Friends of the Department of the Arts of Africa, Oceania, and the Americas.
Mastering the Art of Chinese Painting: Xie Zhiliu (1910-1997)
Through July 25, 2010
This exhibition includes a selection of around 150 works drawn from a recent gift of more than 300 paintings, sketches and studies, poetry manuscripts, and artist seals done by or for Xie Zhiliu (1910-1997), one of modern China's leading traditional artists and connoisseurs. Together, these studies illustrate how Chinese artists historically have learned both from earlier masterpieces and from nature, and provide unique insights into the artistic process.
Sounding the Pacific: Musical Instruments of Oceania
Through September 6, 2010
Music is a universal human phenomenon. Musical instruments and musical expression, however, take an almost infinite variety of forms throughout the world. This is especially true in Oceania (the Pacific Islands), where more than 1800 different peoples create an astonishing diversity of musical instruments, from familiar types such as drums, flutes, and the Hawaiian ukulele, to unusual forms such as slit gongs carved in the form of ancestral catfish, bullroarers whose eerie whirring sounds are said to be the voices of supernatural beings, and delicate stringed instruments with sounding chambers fashioned from palm leaves. From the tropical rainforests of Island Southeast Asia, to the deserts of Australia, to remote coral atolls, musical instruments in Oceania play central roles in activities ranging from religious rituals and initiations, to feasts, celebrations, courting, and secular entertainment.
This exhibition—the first in an art museum to be devoted exclusively to Oceanic musical instruments—explores the rich diversity of musical instruments created and used in the Pacific Islands. Drawn primarily from the Metropolitan's collections, the exhibition features more than 60 instruments from small personal types such as panpipes and courting whistles to larger forms played at performances heard by the entire community, such as the exquisitely carved temple drums of the Austral Islands or the imposing sacred slit gongs of New Guinea.
The exhibition is made possible through the generosity of the Friends of the Department of the Arts of Africa, Oceania, and the Americas.
Masterpieces of French Art Deco: Selections from the Collection
Through fall 2010
French Art Deco is one of the great strengths of the Metropolitan's modern design collection. The Museum has been collecting actively in this area since the 1920s, when pieces were acquired directly from their designers in Paris. This presentation in The Helen and Milton A. Kimmelman Gallery features many of the collection's most important works, some of which have not been shown for generations.
The installation includes furniture by Émile-Jacques Ruhlmann, Louis Süe and André Mare, Armand-Albert Rateau, and Pierre Legrain; works in glass by René Jules Lalique, Maurice Marinot, and Henri Navarre; ceramics by Émile Lenoble and Emile Decoeur; metalwork by Jean Puiforcat and Edgar Brandt; textiles by Paul Poiret; jewelry by Georges Fouquet; lacquer work by Jean Dunand; and the magnificent set of reverse-painted and gilded glass panels designed by Jean Dupas for the first-class salon of the ocean liner Normandie.
Highlights from the Modern Design Collection: 1900 to the Present
Through fall 2010
This installation of highlights from the Museum's modern and contemporary design collection features 46 objects spanning the past century up to the present, including Charles Rennie Mackintosh's hand-crafted oak, tile, and glass washstand (1904); Marcel Breuer's iconic modernist "Wassily" chair (1927); a 1985 Formica "Ivory" table by Italian designer Ettore Sottsass; and architect Zaha Hadid's 2006 "Gyre" lounge chair, made of polyester resin and lacquer. Also presented are metalwork, ceramics, glass, jewelry, drawings, and posters.
Tibetan Arms and Armor from the Permanent Collection
Through fall 2010
This installation presents approximately 35 highlights from the Museum's extensive collection of rare and exquisitely decorated armor, weapons, and equestrian equipment from Tibet and related areas of Mongolia and China, dating from the 8th to the 20th century. Included are several recent acquisitions that have never before been exhibited or published.
American Landscapes
Opened May 20, 2008
The first floor of the newly renovated Robert Lehman Wing displays nine large and superb American landscape paintings from the Metropolitan Museum's collection, enabling visitors to view selected highlights of American art during the major reordering and upgrading of The American Wing galleries and period rooms, scheduled for completion in 2012.
NEW GALLERIES
André Mertens Galleries for Musical Instruments
March 2, 2010
After an eight-month hiatus, the gallery devoted to Western musical instruments will reopen, showcasing more than 230 works of art drawn primarily from the Metropolitan's extensive holdings, among the most important in the world. The new installation will focus attention on individual masterworks by exploring each work within its musical and cultural context, by offering exciting comparisons of how individual makers realized the same concept, and by introducing examples of the various instruments' developments. Among the wide range of objects on view—keyboard, string, percussion, woodwind, and brass instruments—a highlight will be the famed "Batta" cello made in Cremona, Italy, by Antonio Stradivari (1644-1737), on loan from a private collection. The reinstallation also includes new acquisitions and objects from the permanent collection that have rarely been seen by the public. Press preview: Monday, March 1, 10 a.m.-noon
Renovation of Late Gothic Hall, The Cloisters
Opened December 8, 2009
The Late Gothic Hall at The Cloisters Museum and Gardens has reopened following an extensive renovation. The four large, 15th-century, French limestone windows from the Dominican monastery in Sens, Burgundy, have been conserved. New leaded glass has been installed on the interior with protective glazing on the exterior. The new installation features a monumental tapestry from Burgos Cathedral representing the Salvation of Man, which returns to public view for the first time in a generation following a thorough campaign of conservation. The Late Gothic Hall, distinguished by its high timber ceiling, also exhibits many of the finest 15th-century works in The Cloisters' collection, including sculptures by Tilman Riemenschneider and richly painted and gilded altarpieces from Spain.
The renovation was funded by The Alice Tully Foundation.
The New American Wing
Part 2: The Charles Engelhard Court and the Period Rooms
Opened May 19, 2009
A major reordering and upgrading of The American Wing galleries and period rooms has begun, and the final phase—including 18 new paintings galleries and renovations to The Henry R. Luce Center for the Study of American Art—is scheduled for completion in 2012. The Wing will remain open, in part, throughout the three-part project. In Part 2, The Charles Engelhard Court has been transformed to better showcase the sculptures, stained-glass windows, and other works on view, and to facilitate public access. Renovations to the balcony include new glass barrier walls and a rethinking of the ceramics, glass, silver, and pewter installations. The addition of a mezzanine level has added over 3,000 square feet of exhibition space and houses the newly announced promised gift from Robert A. Ellison Jr. of American ceramics, 1876–1956. Many of the 17th- and 18th-century period rooms have been moved or replaced as the Wing's architectural holdings were upgraded. Access to the period rooms has been improved by the installation of a new glass-walled public elevator.
Part 1, New Classical Galleries on the first floor of The American Wing, opened to the public in 2007.
Mary and Michael Jaharis Galleries for Byzantine Art
and the Medieval Europe Gallery
Opened November 18, 2008
Portions of the Medieval Galleries have been renovated thanks to the generous support of Mary and Michael Jaharis. The apse beneath the Great Hall Stairs has become part of the Mary and Michael Jaharis Galleries for Byzantine Art and features the Museum's newly acquired manuscript, the Jaharis Byzantine Lectionary, a rare masterpiece of Byzantine art from around the year 1100. An 18-foot-tall marble ciborium (altar canopy) from 12th–century Italy is the focal point of the former Tapestry Hall that has become a new gallery of Medieval Europe devoted to works of art in all media from about 1050 to 1300.
Joyce and Robert Menschel Hall for Modern Photography
Opened September 25, 2007
The Joyce and Robert Menschel Hall for Modern Photography is the Metropolitan's first gallery designed specifically for and devoted exclusively to the display of photographs created since 1960. Situated adjacent to the special exhibition galleries for drawings, prints, and photographs and the portion of the Robert Wood Johnson, Jr. Gallery where the earlier history of photography is displayed, Menschel Hall allows the Department of Photographs to show its contemporary holdings within the broader context of photographic traditions and in an exhibition space with appropriate scale and detail. Installations, which change every six months, are drawn from the department's growing permanent collection.
The Wrightsman Galleries for French Decorative Arts
Reopened October 30, 2007
The Wrightsman Galleries for French decorative arts underwent extensive renovations to improve climate control, introduce new lighting and fire suppression systems, and incorporate numerous decorative changes. The new lighting, in particular, greatly enhances the revised presentation of the Museum's renowned collection of French furniture and related decorative arts. All of the 18th-century boiseries, as well as many objects, have received conservation treatment and a set of seat furniture has been reupholstered with a modern re-creation of the original embroidered show covers. The galleries include a number of artworks previously not on view, such as a late 18th-century carved and gilded state bed.
Galleries for Oceanic Art
Opened November 14, 2007
The islands of the Pacific Ocean encompass nearly 1,800 distinct cultures and hundreds of artistic traditions in an area that covers about one-third of the earth's surface. The Museum's new permanent galleries for Oceanic art in The Michael C. Rockefeller Wing, completely redesigned and reinstalled, present a substantially larger portion of the Museum's Oceanic holdings than was previously on view. Featuring renowned masterworks from the Metropolitan's Oceanic collection as well as recent acquisitions, the installation displays sculpture and decorative arts from the regions of Polynesia, Melanesia, Micronesia, and Australia. The displays also feature the Museum's first gallery devoted to the arts of the indigenous peoples of Island Southeast Asia. The publication is made possible by The Peter Jay Sharp Foundation and
The MCS Endowment Fund.
Gallery for the Art of Native North America
Opened November 14, 2007
The Museum's renovated gallery devoted to Native North American art displays approximately 90 works made by numerous American peoples. Ranging from the beautifully shaped stone tools known as bannerstones of several millennia B.C. to a mid-1970s tobacco bag, the objects illustrate a wide variety of cultural backgrounds, artistic styles, and functional purposes, all qualities inherent in the art of the peoples of the North American continent. Works include wood sculpture from the Northwest Coast of North America, ivory carvings from the Arctic, wearing blankets from the Southwest, and objects of hide from the Great Plains. Anchored by the Metropolitan's American Indian holdings drawn from the Michael C. Rockefeller Memorial Collection, the installation is augmented by loans from the well-known private collections of Ralph T. Coe of Santa Fe and Mr. and Mrs. Charles Diker of New York.
Galleries for 19th- and Early 20th-Century European Paintings and Sculpture
Including the Henry J. Heinz II Galleries
Opened December 4, 2007
The New Galleries for 19th- and Early 20th-Century European Paintings and Sculpture have opened to the public with renovated rooms and more than 8,000 square feet of additional gallery space—the Henry J. Heinz II Galleries—to showcase works from 1800 through the early 20th century. The renovated and expanded galleries feature all of the Museum's most loved 19th-century paintings, which have been on permanent display in the past, as well as works by Bonnard, Vuillard, Matisse, Picasso, and other early modern artists. Among the many additions are a full-room assembly of "The Wisteria Dining Room," a French art nouveau interior designed by Lucien Lévy-Dhurmer shortly before World War I that is the only complete example of its kind in the United States; Henry Lerolle's large painting The Organ Rehearsal (a church interior of 1885), recently cleaned; a group of newly acquired 19th-century landscape oil sketches; and a selection of rarely exhibited paintings by an international group of artists.
OUTGOING LOAN EXHIBITIONS
PLEASE NOTE: These exhibitions originate at The Metropolitan Museum of Art with works of art from the Museum's collections selected and organized by Museum staff members. Please confirm the opening and closing dates with the local exhibiting museums as they may be subject to change.
American High Style: Fashioning a National Collection
American High Style: Fashioning a National Collection will celebrate the Brooklyn Museum's Costume Collection and its history. Organized in groups that represent its strengths and significance, this overview will include approximately 85 fashion masterworks dating from the mid-19th century to the late 20th century augmented by a selection of accessories, drawings, sketches, and other fashion-related material. It will include works by major French and American designers such as Adrian, Elizabeth Hawes, Charles James, Jean Lanvin, Norman Norell, Jeanne Paquin, Elsa Schiaparelli, Valentina, Madeleine Vionnet, and Charles Frederick Worth, among others. Brooklyn Museum, New York May 7–August 1, 2010
VISITOR INFORMATION
MAIN BUILDING HOURS
Fridays and Saturdays 9:30 a.m.–9:00 p.m.
Sundays, Tuesdays–Thursdays 9:30 a.m.–5:30 p.m.
Met Holiday Mondays in the Main Building 9:30 a.m.–5:30 p.m.
May 31, July 5, September 6, October 11, December 27, 2010
All other Mondays Closed
January 1, Thanksgiving, and December 25 Closed
THE CLOISTERS MUSEUM AND GARDENS HOURS
November–February:
Tuesdays–Sundays 9:30 a.m.–4:45 p.m.
Mondays Closed
March–October:
Tuesdays–Sundays 9:30 a.m.–5:15 p.m.
Mondays Closed
RECOMMENDED ADMISSION (INCLUDES MAIN BUILDING AND THE CLOISTERS MUSEUM AND GARDENS ON THE SAME DAY)
Adults $20.00
Seniors (65 and over) $15.00
Students $10.00
Members and children under 12
accompanied by adult Free
Advance tickets available at www.TicketWeb.com or 1-800-965-4827
For more information (212) 535-7710; www.metmuseum.org
