EDITORS PLEASE NOTE: Information provided below is subject to change. To confirm scheduling and dates, call the Communications Department at (212) 570-3951. CONTACT NUMBER FOR USE IN TEXT IS (212) 535-7710.
Upcoming Exhibitions
Continuing Exhibitions
New & Continuing Installations
New Galleries
Visitor Information
UPCOMING EXHIBITIONS
A Renaissance Masterpiece Revealed: Filippino Lippi's Madonna and Child
January 15–April 25, 2011
Filippino Lippi (1457-1504) is one of the great artists of 15th-century Florence. Among his principal patrons was the wealthy banker Filippo Strozzi (1428–1491), who commissioned a Madonna and Child for his villa at Santuccio, west of the city. This painting was bequeathed to the Metropolitan Museum by Jules Bache in 1949. In preparation for an exhibition on the artist that will be held in Rome next year, the picture was taken to conservation for examination this fall. A test cleaning revealed that beneath a thick, discolored varnish there was a beautifully preserved, richly colored painting. So striking is the transformation that the picture seems a new acquisition. To celebrate this restoration, The Metropolitan Museum of Art is mounting A Renaissance Masterpiece Revealed: Filippino Lippi's Madonna and Child, a focused exhibition, that will include the picture and a number of objects in the Museum's permanent collection that can be associated with the Strozzi by their coat of arms, which has three crescent moons. The objects include a textile, a wooden chair, a cassone, and a column capital from the Palazzo Strozzi—the grandest of all 15th-century palaces in Florence.
The Emperor's Private Paradise: Treasures from the Forbidden City
February 1–May 1, 2011
This loan exhibition organized by the Peabody Essex Museum presents some 90 paintings, decorative works, architectural elements, and religious works created for an elaborate two-acre private retreat built deep within the Forbidden City in 1771 as the retirement residence of one of China's most extravagant monarchs—the Qianlong Emperor (r. 1736-95)—who presided over China's last dynasty, the Qing, at the zenith of its power and wealth. No expense was spared to make this complex as sumptuous and comfortable as possible. The costliest materials, including rare woods, semi-precious stones, cloisonné, gilt bronze, porcelain, and lacquer were employed to ornament every surface of this world. In the end the emperor declined to retire here and the space remained a virtual time capsule relatively untouched since imperial times. The exhibition was organized by the Peabody Essex Museum in partnership with the Palace Museum, Beijing, and in cooperation with the World Monuments Fund.
Accompanied by a catalogue.
Press preview: Monday, January 31, 10:00 a.m.–noon
Cézanne's Card Players
February 9–May 8, 2011
This exhibition reunites for the first time the works from Cézanne's series of card player canvases together with their associated oil studies and drawings. Also included will be a carefully selected group of Cézanne's related paintings of peasants, several of which depict the same local models who appear in the card player compositions. The exhibition was organized by The Courtauld Gallery, London, and The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York.
Accompanied by a catalogue.
Press preview: Monday, February 7, 10:00 a.m.–noon
Guitar Heroes: Legendary Craftsmen from Italy to New York
February 9–July 4, 2011
The exhibition will feature the guitars and other stringed instruments made by John D'Angelico, James D'Aquisto, and John Monteleone, three New York master luthiers of Italian descent. Their instruments will be presented against the backdrop of the long tradition of Italian stringed instrument-making that has thrived for more than 500 years. The exhibition will include approximately 80 musical instruments, including many masterpieces from the Museum's permanent collection, as well as instruments on loan from museums, private collectors, and performers.
Accompanied by a publication.
Press preview: Monday, February 7, 10:00 a.m.–noon
The Andean Tunic, 400 BCE-1800 CE
March 8-September 18, 2011
Featuring about 30 Andean tunics drawn from the Museum's collection, as well as loans from the Textile Museum in Washington, D.C., and a private collection, the exhibition will examine the form of the tunic—essentially a type of shirt, which held an important cultural place in Andean South America for centuries, particularly in Peru and northern Bolivia. Textiles, a much developed art form there in ancient times, were themselves valued as wealth, and tunics were among the most treasured of textiles. Highlights will include a Paracas-Necropolis tunic in the so-called linear style with distinctive shoulder fringe (100 BCE–200 CE), a red Pucara tunic with large shoulder patches, perhaps depicting the face of the sun (200 BCE–200 CE), and a 17th-century tunic that includes both European lions and tocapu, organized fields of discrete Inka period designs.
Press preview: Monday, March 7, 10 a.m. – noon
Rooms with a View: The Open Window in the 19th Century
April 5–July 4, 2011
This exhibition will focus on the romantic motif of the open window as first captured by German, Danish, French, and Russian artists around 1810-20. These works include hushed sparse rooms showing contemplative figures, studios with artists at work, and window views as sole motif. The exhibition will feature some 30 oils and 30 works on paper by, among others, C. D. Friedrich, C. G. Carus, G. F. Kersting, Adolph Menzel, C. W. Eckersberg, Martinus Rørbye, Jean Alaux, Léon Cogniet, and F. P. Tolstoi. Loans to the exhibition will come from museums in Germany, Denmark, France, Austria, Switzerland, Russia, and the United States.
The exhibition is made possible by the Anna-Maria and Stephen Kellen Foundation and the Isaacson-Draper Foundation.
Accompanied by a catalogue.
Press preview: Monday, March 28, 10:00 a.m. - noon
Korean Buncheong Ceramics from the Leeum Collection
April 7–August 2011
This exhibition focusing on Buncheong ware, the bold and dynamic ceramic art that flourished in Korea during the 15th and 16th centuries, will feature approximately 60 works from the renowned collection of the Leeum Samsung Museum of Art in Seoul, Korea. Included in the exhibition will be select works by modern/contemporary potters, highlighting how this tradition, which had disappeared in Korea for 400 years, has been revived and transformed by today's artists. In addition, the exhibition will feature a handful of Edo-period Japanese ceramics from the Museum's permanent collection, to illustrate Japanese revivals of the Buncheong idiom.
Accompanied by a catalogue.
Press preview: Wednesday, April 6, 10:00 a.m. - noon
Richard Serra Drawing: A Retrospective
April 13–August 28, 2011
This first retrospective of the drawings of American contemporary artist Richard Serra traces his investigation of drawing as an activity both independent from and linked to his sculptural practice. Serra's drawings have played a crucial role in his work for more than 40 years, yet they have not been as widely recognized as his sculptures. This major exhibition features some 60 works from the 1970s to the present, including many loans from European and American public and private collections. Serra's drawings from the early 1970s began as a means of exploring formal and perceptual relationships between his sculpture and the viewer; with time they evolved into autonomous works of art and increased in scale. In the mid-1970s, Serra made the first of his monumentally scaled Installation Drawings, some of which hang from floor to ceiling. To make these works, the artist attached linen directly to the wall and applied black paintstick using repetitive and vigorous physical gestures. Over the last 25 years, working primarily on paper, Serra has continued to invent new drawing techniques and radically change the practice and definition of drawing. The exhibition will culminate with new large-scale works completed specifically for this presentation.
The exhibition is made possible in part by the Jane and Robert Carroll Fund. The exhibition was organized by The Menil Collection, Houston.
Accompanied by a catalogue.
Press preview: Monday, April 11, 10:00 a.m. - noon
Alexander McQueen: Savage Beauty
May 4–July 31, 2011
The exhibition, organized by The Costume Institute, will celebrate the late Alexander McQueen's extraordinary contributions to fashion. From his postgraduate collection of 1992 to his final runway presentation which took place after his death in February 2010, Mr. McQueen challenged and expanded the understanding of fashion beyond utility to a conceptual expression of culture, politics, and identity. His iconic designs constitute the work of an artist whose medium of expression was fashion. Approximately 100 examples will be on view including signature designs such as the bumster trouser, the kimono jacket, and the Origami frock coat, as well as pieces reflecting the exaggerated silhouettes of the 1860s, 1880s, 1890s, and 1950s which he crafted into contemporary silhouettes that transmitted romantic narratives. Technical ingenuity imbued his designs with an innovative sensibility that kept him at fashion's vanguard.
The exhibition is made possible by Alexander McQueen™.
Additional support is provided in partnership by American Express and Condé Nast.
Press preview: Monday, May 2, 10:00 a.m. – noon
Pastel Portraits: Images of 18th-Century Europe
May 17–August 14, 2011
This exhibition will include about 40 European pastel portraits from The Metropolitan Museum of Art's collection, and from other museums and private collections in New York, New Jersey, and New England. The nucleus is a group of French works (Maurice Quentin de La Tour will be shown in some strength) and the English, German, Italian, and Swiss schools will also be represented.
The exhibition is made possible by the Gail and Parker Gilbert Fund.
Accompanied by a publication.
Press preview: Monday, May 16, 10:00 a.m. - noon
Historic Images of the Greek Bronze Age: The Reproductions of E. Gilliéron & Son
May 17–November 13, 2011
This exhibition features a selection of early 20th-century reproductions of now-famous artworks from Sir Arthur Evans's historic excavations of Minoan Crete and Heinrich Schliemann's Mycenaean Greece. Emile Gilliéron and later his son were the senior draftsmen for Evans responsible for reconstructing the fresco paintings in the palace at Knossos. The Gilliérons formed a thriving business selling original watercolors after the frescoes and other reproductions of three-dimensional artworks, which they made directly from the originals. Their work influenced the study of Aegean art and was integral to its widespread introduction throughout Europe and America. The installation draws from the Metropolitan Museum's own collection of Gilliéron reproductions, which is the largest in existence.
The exhibition is made possible by The Vlachos Family Fund.
Press preview: Monday, May 16, 10:00 a.m. – noon
Frans Hals in the Metropolitan Museum
July 26—October 10, 2011
The Metropolitan Museum of Art holds the most important collection of paintings in America by the celebrated Dutch artist Frans Hals (1582/83-1666), whose portraits and genre scenes were famous in his lifetime for their immediacy and dazzling brushwork. Frans Hals in the Metropolitan Museum will present thirteen paintings by Hals, including two lent from private collections, and several works by other Netherlandish masters. Several of the Museum's paintings by Hals are famous, especially the early Merrymakers at Shrovetide (ca. 1616) and the so-called Jonker Ramp and His Sweetheart (1623), both bequeathed to the Museum by Benjamin Altman in 1913. Also included in the exhibition will be two loans from private collections in New York—the small, exquisite Portrait of Samuel Ampzing (1630), on copper, and the well-known Fisher Girl (1630-32). A selection of other Dutch paintings from the Museum's collection and a few engravings will set Hals's work in the context of his native Haarlem and will help clarify how exceptional his animated poses and virtuoso brushwork were at the time. A portrait by Manet, inspired by Hals, will also demonstrate how strongly Hals anticipated Impressionist effects.
Accompanied by a Bulletin.
Press Preview: Monday, July 25, 10:00 a.m. – noon
CONTINUING EXHIBITIONS
Katrin Sigurdardottir at the Met
Through May 30, 2011
Two new sculptural installations created by Katrin Sigurdardottir, an Icelandic artist (born 1967) who lives and works in New York City and Reykjavik, are the focus of this exhibition. Sigurdardottir is known for her highly detailed renditions of places, both real and fictional, that often incorporate an element of surprise. Entitled Boiseries, the installations are interpretations of 18th-century French rooms preserved at the Metropolitan, one from the Hôtel de Crillon (1777–1780) on the Place de la Concorde, Paris, and the other from the Hôtel de Cabris (ca. 1775) at Grasse in Provence. The exhibition is the seventh in the Metropolitan's series of solo exhibitions of the work of contemporary artists at mid-career.
The exhibition is made possible in part by Sarah Peter.
The Artistic Furniture of Charles Rohlfs
Through 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 is made possible by Alamo Rent A Car. Additional support is provided by the Windgate Charitable Foundation. The exhibition was organized by the Milwaukee Art Museum, the Chipstone Foundation, and American Decorative Art 1900 Foundation.
Accompanied by a catalogue.
Stieglitz, Steichen, Strand
Through 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 photography by these artists will be revealed through a presentation of more than 100 works 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 enter the Museum's collection 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 the Photo-Secession, 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 double issue of Camera Work (1917) was devoted to the young Paul Strand, whose photographs from 1915-1917 treated three principal themes—movement in the city, abstractions, and street portraits—and pioneered a shift from the soft-focus and painterly aesthetic of Pictorialism to the straight approach and graphic power of an emerging modernism.
Accompanied by a publication.
Haremhab, The General Who Became King
Through July 4, 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.1316–1302 B.C.).
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 its arms and lower legs, remained for decades in the Fifth Avenue mansion that 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.
NEW & CONTINUING INSTALLATIONS
Thinking Outside the Box: European Cabinets, Caskets, and Cases from the Permanent Collection (1500-1900)
December 7, 2010–August 11, 2011
For centuries, boxes, caskets, cabinets, and chests played an important role in everyday life. Ranging from strongboxes to travel cases and from containers for tea or tobacco to those for the storage of toiletries or silverware, these lidded pieces were made in a large variety of shapes and sizes, and of many different materials. Thinking Outside the Box: European Cabinets, Caskets, and Cases from the Permanent Collection (1500–1900) will feature a selection of 100 examples of important boxes, caskets, and small chests from the Metropolitan Museum's Department of European Sculpture and Decorative Arts. The form and decoration of these objects not only reflect changes in social customs and manners but also follow the stylistic developments in Europe that spans 400 years. Pieces made of tortoiseshell, carved or inlaid wood, porcelain, hard stones and natural substances, embroidery, various metals, leather, enamel, pastiglia, and straw will be included. These objects, some of which have not been on display for years, were much more than mere containers and often became precious works of art, collected in their own right.
Between Here and There: Passages in Contemporary Photography
Through February 21, 2011
Themes of dislocation and displacement in contemporary photography are explored in this exhibition of works drawn almost entirely from the Museum's collection. The exhibition features 21 artists whose photographic works convey a sense of a rootless or unfixed existence. In the 1960s and 1970s, photography was often embraced by artists who were interested in creating a work of art that took place over a period of time, in a serial progression, or in a fleeting gesture. Artists such as Richard Long, Ed Ruscha, and On Kawara showed how a work of art could take the form of a walk, a 20-foot-long book, or a series of postcards. Since the 1980s, however, the more conventional practice of creating a singular photograph has regained prominence in contemporary art. Works by Rineke Dijkstra, Thomas Struth, and Weng Fen embody a belief in photography's traditional powers of description, while reflecting feelings of dislocation in our newly global society. The exhibition also includes works by Vito Acconci, Doug Aitken, Darren Almond, Lothar Baumgarten, Matthew Buckingham, VALIE EXPORT, Felix Gonzalez-Torres, Svetlana Kopystiansky, Bruce Nauman, Dennis Oppenheim, Allen Ruppersberg, Fazal Sheikh, Erin Shirreff, Robert Smithson, Anne Turyn, and Jeff Wall.
Rugs and Ritual in Tibetan Buddhism
Through June 26, 2011
Thirty works dedicated to the enactment of Tibetan Vajrayana Buddhism, focusing on Tibetan tantric rugs as the seats of power employed by practitioners of esoteric Buddhism, form this installation. These rugs typically depict the flayed skin of an animal or human and, together with associated ritual utensils, are the tools employed in the enactment of esoteric rites associated with protective deities. The employment of these images and ritual tools celebrate the power of detachment from the corporal body that advanced Buddhist practitioners strive to attain. It will feature two large ritual tangkas in the Museum, together with the rugs upon which the practitioner sits, or upon which his ritual utensils are placed, as well as a rich assortment of associated ritual paraphernalia. Many are rarely seen objects from private collections.
"Our Future Is In The Air": Photographs from the 1910s
Through April 10, 2011
The 1910s—a period remembered for "The Great War," technological innovation, social ferment, the influenza epidemic, and the birth of Hollywood—was a dynamic and tumultuous decade that ushered in the modern era. The new age of the automobile, the airplane, and the industrial factory—as it was captured by the quintessentially modern art of photography—is the subject of this eclectic centennial exhibition devoted to photography of the 1910s. Drawn exclusively from the Museum's collection, "Our Future Is In The Air" features 44 photographs by some 25 artists, including Eugène Atget, Alvin Langdon Coburn, Eugène Druet, Lewis Hine, Jacques-Henri Lartigue, Adolph de Meyer, Christian Schad, Morton Schamberg, Charles Sheeler, and Stanislaw Witkiewicz. The exhibition complements the Museum's concurrent presentation of the groundbreaking photographs by Alfred Stieglitz, Edward Steichen, and Paul Strand, in the adjacent exhibition Stieglitz, Steichen, Strand.
Masterpieces of French Art Deco: Selections from the Collection
Through January 23
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 May 1, 2011
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.
Sounding the Pacific: Musical Instruments of Oceania
Through January 23, 2011
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.
Tibetan Arms and Armor from the Permanent Collection
Through spring 2012
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 eighth 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 January 2012.
NEW GALLERIES
The André Mertens Galleries for Musical Instruments
Opened March 2, 2010
After an eight-month hiatus, the gallery devoted to Western musical instruments has reopened, 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 focuses 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 is 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.
Renovation of the 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 is well underway, and the final phase—including 18 paintings galleries and five galleries of 18th-century decorative arts as well as renovations to The Henry R. Luce Center for the Study of American Art—is scheduled for completion in January 2012. New galleries of late Neoclassical decorative arts, on the first floor of The American Wing, opened in 2007. In 2009, The Charles Engelhard Court was 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 more than 3,000 square feet of exhibition space and houses the recently 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.
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 works of art previously not on view, such as a late 18th-century carved and gilded state bed.
Accompanied by a catalogue.
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.
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, 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.
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.
December 27, 2010; January 17, February 21, April 25 and May 30, 2011
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
Express admission may be purchased in advance at www.metmuseum.org/visit
For more information (212) 535-7710; www.metmuseum.org
No extra charge for any exhibition
# # #
January 18, 2011
Press resources