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Classic 1930s Street Photographs of New York City on View at Metropolitan Museum September 23
Wednesday, September 17, 2008, 4:00 a.m.
In the late 1930s, Rudy Burckhardt—then a recent émigré to America from Switzerland—photographed his adopted hometown of New York City, and immediately made some of the most lyrical, witty, and poetic images of the city ever created. New York, N. Why?: Photographs by Rudy Burckhardt, 1937–1940, opening September 23 at the Metropolitan Museum, will present in its entirety Burckhardt's unique, handmade album of 67 classic images of sidewalks, outdoor advertising, and pedestrians, selected and sequenced by Burckhardt in 1940 and acquired by the Museum in 1972.
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Contemporary Works by African-American Artists Featured in Provocative Visions Installation
Monday, September 15, 2008, 4:00 a.m.
Thirteen works by seven contemporary African-American artists – Chakaia Booker, Willie Cole, Glenn Ligon, Whitfield Lovell, Alison Saar, Lorna Simpson, and Kara Walker – are featured at The Metropolitan Museum of Art in Provocative Visions: Race and Identity – Selections from the Permanent Collection. The installation, which opened August 19, examines the ways these artists challenge accepted perceptions and assumptions about race, gender, and identity. Cultural heritage and personal history provide a context for these images. All of the sculptures, prints, and drawings were acquired during the past 13 years, within a year or two of their creation – supported in large part by gifts from the Peter Norton Family Foundation and the Hortense and William A. Mohr Sculpture Purchase Fund. Most works are on display at the Metropolitan Museum for the first time.
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Exquisite 19th Century Porcelain from Europe's Most Renowned Factories on View at Metropolitan Museum
Thursday, September 11, 2008, 4:00 a.m.
The porcelain factories of Berlin, Sèvres, and Vienna achieved a remarkable level of artistic and technical skill in the first half of the 19th century, and the quality of painted decoration practiced at these three factories at this time has never been surpassed. Approximately 75 extraordinary examples from these three European porcelain manufactories will be on view at The Metropolitan Museum of Art beginning September 16, 2008, in the exhibition Royal Porcelain from the Twinight Collection, 1800-1850. The exhibition will illustrate the exchange of ideas and styles among the factories that resulted in some of the most splendid porcelain ever produced.
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Thomas P. Campbell Named Next Director of The Metropolitan Museum of Art
Wednesday, September 10, 2008, 4:00 a.m.
(New York, September 9, 2008)—The Metropolitan Museum of Art announced today that Thomas P. Campbell – an accomplished curator with a specialty in European tapestry who has worked at the Museum since 1995 – has been elected its next Director and CEO, succeeding Philippe de Montebello, who announced in January his intention to retire from the Metropolitan Museum at the end of this year. Mr. Campbell, who organized the groundbreaking and widely acclaimed exhibitions Tapestry in the Renaissance: Art and Magnificence (2002) and Tapestry in the Baroque: Threads of Splendor (2007), is currently Curator in the Department of European Sculpture and Decorative Arts as well as Supervising Curator of the Museum's Antonio Ratti Textile Center. He was elected at today's meeting of the Board of Trustees and will assume the directorship of the Metropolitan Museum on January 1, 2009.
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Metropolitan Museum Concerts 2008-2009 Season Opens with the Orpheus Chamber Orchestra Joined by Metropolitan Museum Director Philippe De Montebello and Pianists Orion Weiss and Inon Barnatan Performing Saint-Saëns's Carnival of the Animals
Monday, September 8, 2008, 4:00 a.m.
To mark both the opening of the 55th anniversary season of the Metropolitan Museum Concerts series and Philippe de Montebello's valedictory year as Metropolitan Museum Director, the Museum will present a concert by the Orpheus Chamber Orchestra that features a performance of Saint-Saëns's Carnival of the Animals with Philippe de Montebello reading the Ogden Nash verses as narrator, and pianists Orion Weiss and Inon Barnatan as soloists. Mendelssohn's Symphony No. 10 for Strings in B Minor; and Mozart's Symphony No. 29 in A Major, K. 201, complete the program, which takes place in the Museum's Grace Rainey Rogers Auditorium.
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Metropolitan Museum Concerts in October 2008
Monday, September 8, 2008, 4:00 a.m.
The Season's PianoForte Series Launches with Rafal Blechacz and Marc-André Hamelin, Itzhak Perlman and the Perlman Music Program Continue Into a Second Concert Season,
Menahem Pressler and Richard Stoltzman Perform Together,
Lesley Gore Makes Her Metropolitan Museum Debut,
Music from Mali, Spain, and Turkey Takes the Stage, and
James Conlon Talks About the Life of a Conductor
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Landscapes by Revered Chinese Painter Wang Hui in Fall Exhibition at Metropolitan Museum
Monday, August 18, 2008, 4:00 a.m.
The paintings of Wang Hui, the most celebrated artist of late 17th-century China, will be featured in an exhibition opening on September 9 at The Metropolitan Museum of Art. Landscapes Clear and Radiant: The Art of Wang Hui (1632-1717) will trace Wang's artistic development – from his early years as a brilliant reinterpreter of classic landscape styles to the pinnacle of his career, when he was chosen to illustrate the Kangxi Emperor's epic 1689 inspection tour of China's cultural heartland – through 27 paintings drawn from the Taipei and Beijing Palace Museums, Shanghai Museum, and several North American collections. The presentation of Wang Hui's career will incorporate 11 works that have never before been exhibited in the West, including two enormous panoramic landscape handscrolls. Wang's paintings will be complemented by a selection of earlier landscapes, drawn largely from the Metropolitan Museum's holdings, that will highlight the sources of Wang Hui's inspiration.
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Metropolitan Museum Announces Recipients of 2008—2009 Fellowships for Research, Travel, and Study
Wednesday, August 13, 2008, 4:00 a.m.
The Metropolitan Museum of Art will host a group of 50 fellows, who consist of graduate students and scholars from the United States and around the world. The fellows will undertake study and research projects, either at the Metropolitan Museum or abroad, for periods ranging from two months to one year, most of them beginning in September 2008.
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Metropolitan Museum to Open on Labor Day "Met Holiday Monday"
Wednesday, August 6, 2008, 4:00 a.m.
Galleries, shops, and dining areas at The Metropolitan Museum of Art will be open to the public on September 1 (Labor Day), the next "Met Holiday Monday." This special viewing day is also the last chance for visitors to see two popular exhibitions: Superheroes: Fashion and Fantasy, which has already had more than 400,000 visitors since it opened on May 7, and Radiance from the Rain Forest: Featherwork in Ancient Peru.
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Metropolitan Museum Acquires Lucas van Leyden Drawing
Wednesday, July 23, 2008, 4:00 a.m.
(New York, July 24, 2008)—The Metropolitan Museum of Art has acquired a drawing of the Archangel Gabriel announcing the birth of Christ by the Netherlandish master Lucas van Leyden (Leyden ca. 1494 – 1533 Leyden), it was announced today. The drawing, dating to the 1520s, enters the Museum's collection through the combination of a promised gift by Leon D. and Debra R. Black and purchase by the Museum. It is now the only drawing by the artist in America.
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Buddhist Manuscript Paintings on View at Metropolitan Museum This Summer
Thursday, July 17, 2008, 4:00 a.m.
An installation of 30 palm-leaf folios from Indian illuminated manuscripts will open at The Metropolitan Museum of Art on July 29, 2008. Featuring some of the earliest surviving Indian manuscripts, dating from the 10th to the 13th century, Early Buddhist Manuscript Painting: The Palm-leaf Tradition will center on one remarkable Mahayanist Buddhist text, the Ashtasahasrika Prajnaparamita Sutra ('Perfection of Wisdom'), illustrated through the Museum's rare holdings of eastern Indian and Nepalese illuminated palm-leaf manuscripts, book-covers, initiation cards, thankas, and sculptures.
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Nan Rosenthal Retires and Marla Prather Joins Modern Art Department at Metropolitan Museum
Wednesday, July 9, 2008, 4:00 a.m.
(New York, July 10, 2008)—After 15 years as Senior Consultant for modern and contemporary art at The Metropolitan Museum of Art, Nan Rosenthal will retire on July 1, it was announced today by Gary Tinterow, Engelhard Curator in Charge of the Department of Nineteenth-Century, Modern, and Contemporary Art at the Metropolitan.
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Metropolitan Museum of Art Announces 2008-2009 Season of Concerts
Wednesday, July 2, 2008, 4:00 a.m.
The 55th Season Opens With Philippe de Montebello Narrating Saint-Saëns's Carnival of the Animals with the Orpheus Chamber Orchestra, and Includes the Return of Itzhak Perlman and the Perlman Music Program; Ten Pianists Including Till Fellner Launching a Beethoven Sonata Cycle; the Complete Beethoven String Quartets; the Farewell Season of the Guarneri String Quartet; Patti Smith, Richie Havens, and Lesley Gore; and Music from Mali, Mexico,
Spain, and Turkey
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Luxury Objects of Carved and Inlaid Semiprecious Stones to be Displayed at Metropolitan Museum
Monday, June 30, 2008, 4:00 a.m.
The Italian term pietre dure – literally meaning "hard stones" – refers to the artistic cutting of semiprecious stones, such as agate, lapis lazuli, and other colorful hardstones, to fashion extravagant luxury objects, from architectural ornament and furniture to ornate display items and personal jewelry. Opening July 1 at The Metropolitan Museum of Art, the landmark exhibition Art of the Royal Court: Treasures in Pietre Dure from the Palaces of Europe will feature more than 170 masterpieces in carved stone, many of them embellished with gold and silver mounts or decorated with exotic woods and other coveted materials. From the Renaissance to the early 19th century, the affluent societies of Europe were mesmerized by works in pietre dure, both as diplomatic gifts and as objects of desire. The presentation at the Metropolitan will offer the most comprehensive overview ever dedicated to this magnificent medium.
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Statement by The Metropolitan Museum of Art on Accident Involving Italian Terracotta Relief Sculpture by Della Robbia
Monday, June 30, 2008, 4:00 a.m.
(NEW YORK, TUESDAY, JULY 1, 2008)—The Metropolitan Museum of Art is saddened to report that late last night or early this morning, a late 15th-century glazed terracotta relief sculpture of Saint Michael the Archangel by Andrea della Robbia (1435-1525), came loose from metal mounts that have long held the framed lunette securely to the wall above a doorway in its European Sculpture and Decorative Arts Galleries. The 62-x-32-inch relief, which has been on view in its current location since 1996, fell to a stone floor and suffered some damage. Preliminary inspection indicates that the relief has not been irrevocably harmed and that it can be repaired and again presented to the public.
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Major Retrospective of British Artist J. M. W. Turner Opens at Metropolitan Museum on July 1
Wednesday, June 25, 2008, 4:00 a.m.
The first major retrospective of the work of celebrated British artist J. M. W. Turner (1775–1851) to be presented in the United States in more than 40 years will be on view at The Metropolitan Museum of Art beginning July 1, 2008. The exhibition J. M. W. Turner will represent the artist's extensive iconographic range, from seascapes and topographical views to historical subjects and scenes from his imagination. More than half of the approximately 140 paintings and watercolors on view will be on loan from Tate Britain, which houses the Turner Bequest, the most comprehensive collection of the artist's work in the world. These will be complemented by works from other collections in Europe and North America.
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Metropolitan Museum Corporate Benefit Breaks Fundraising Record
Monday, June 23, 2008, 4:00 a.m.
In recognition of his outstanding leadership in support of the arts and community enrichment, Kenneth D. Lewis, chairman, chief executive officer and president of Bank of America Corporation, was honored at The Metropolitan Museum of Art's 2008 Corporate Benefit on Monday, June 23.
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Metropolitan Museum Explores Relationship of Art and Science during First Annual World Science Festival
Tuesday, May 27, 2008, 4:00 a.m.
A variety of special programs – including lectures, gallery tours, family activities, and the inauguration of a new Audio Guide program – focusing on art and science will take place at The Metropolitan Museum of Art from May 28 through June 1 as part of New York City's first annual World Science Festival.
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Highlights of Metropolitan Museum's American Art Collection Remain on View During American Wing Construction Project
Monday, May 26, 2008, 4:00 a.m.
Many of the best-known and most beloved works from the Metropolitan Museum's preeminent collection of American art will remain on view in various locations throughout the Museum for the duration of a four-year construction project – scheduled for completion in winter 2010-11. The project will reconfigure, renovate, or upgrade nearly every section of The American Wing. A major goal of the plan is to improve public access to, and visitor flow within, The American Wing's galleries.
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Hindu God Krishna Celebrated in New Installation at Metropolitan Museum
Thursday, May 22, 2008, 4:00 a.m.
A new installation at The Metropolitan Museum of Art – Krishna: Mythology and Worship – celebrates the Hindu god Krishna, perhaps the most popular of all the appearances (avatars) of the Indian Hindu deity Vishnu. The installation of 23 painting, textiles, and sculptures from the Museum's collection will be on view in the Museum's Florence and Herbert Irving Galleries for the Arts of South and Southeast Asia through July 28, 2008. Most of the paintings on display are manuscript pages produced in Rajasthan and the Punjab Hills, illustrating popular events from Krishna's life. The textiles were employed to enhance shrines devoted to Krishna.