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Metropolitan Museum of Art | HearLore
Metropolitan Museum of Art
The Metropolitan Museum of Art opened its doors on the 20th of February 1872, housed in a modest building at 681 Fifth Avenue, yet it was already destined to become the largest art museum in the Americas. Founded just two years prior by a group of Americans including philanthropists, artists, and businessmen, the institution was created with a singular goal: to establish a national museum that would inspire and educate the public. Among the founders was Theodore Roosevelt Sr., the father of the 26th president of the United States, alongside railroad executive John Taylor Johnston, who served as the first president. The museum's initial collection was sparse, consisting of a Roman stone sarcophagus and 174 mostly European paintings, but the vision was grand. By 1880, the museum had outgrown its temporary locations and moved into the first portion of its current building, a red-brick and stone structure designed by Calvert Vaux and Jacob Wrey Mould. This building, located on the eastern edge of Central Park, would eventually expand to become one of the world's largest art museums, covering more than 20 times the size of the original 1880 structure. The museum's growth was rapid, and by the early 20th century, it had already begun to acquire significant collections that would define its encyclopedic nature.
The Architecture Of Power
The physical expansion of the Metropolitan Museum of Art was as ambitious as its curatorial goals, transforming it from a small gallery into a monumental Beaux-Arts complex. The Fifth Avenue facade, Great Hall, and Grand Stairway were designed by Richard Morris Hunt and his son, Richard Howland Hunt, in the late 1890s and early 1900s, establishing a grandeur that matched the city's growing cultural aspirations. The museum building is an accretion of over 20 structures, most of which are not visible from the exterior, creating a labyrinthine interior that houses more than 20 times the floor space of the original 1880 building. The City of New York owns the museum building and contributes utilities, heat, and some of the cost of guardianship, while the collections are owned by a private corporation of fellows and benefactors. The museum's main building was designated a city landmark in 1967 and a National Historic Landmark in 1986, recognizing both its monumental architecture and its importance as a cultural institution. The modernistic glass sides and rear of the museum are the work of Roche-Dinkeloo, and the Iris and B. Gerald Cantor Roof Garden is located on the roof near the southwestern corner of the museum. The museum's main building was designated a city landmark by the New York City Landmarks Preservation Commission in 1967, and its interior was separately recognized by the Landmarks Preservation Commission in 1977. The museum's main building was designated a National Historic Landmark in 1986, recognizing both its monumental architecture, and its importance as a cultural institution.
When did the Metropolitan Museum of Art open its doors?
The Metropolitan Museum of Art opened its doors on the 20th of February 1872. The institution was founded two years prior by a group of Americans including philanthropists, artists, and businessmen.
Who founded the Metropolitan Museum of Art and what was their goal?
The Metropolitan Museum of Art was founded by a group of Americans including philanthropists, artists, and businessmen with the goal to establish a national museum that would inspire and educate the public. Among the founders was Theodore Roosevelt Sr., the father of the 26th president of the United States, alongside railroad executive John Taylor Johnston who served as the first president.
What is the significance of the Temple of Dendur in the Metropolitan Museum of Art collection?
The Temple of Dendur is a large sandstone temple dismantled by the Egyptian government to save it from rising waters caused by the building of the Aswan High Dam. The temple was given to the United States in 1965 and assembled in a new wing at the Metropolitan Museum of Art in 1978.
How many costumes and accessories does the Costume Institute of the Metropolitan Museum of Art hold?
The Costume Institute of the Metropolitan Museum of Art holds more than 35,000 costumes and accessories. The institute is known for hosting the annual Met Gala and holds two separate shows in the Met's galleries every year.
When did the Metropolitan Museum of Art begin charging out-of-state and foreign visitors?
The Metropolitan Museum of Art began charging out-of-state and foreign visitors $25 effective March 2018. This change replaced the century-old policy of free admission announced by museum president Daniel Weiss in January 2018.
Who donated the largest gift in the history of the Metropolitan Museum of Art?
Oscar L. Tang and Agnes Hsu-Tang donated $125 million to the Metropolitan Museum of Art in November 2021, which is the largest gift in the museum's history. The Met named its modern and contemporary art galleries after the Tangs in exchange for this donation.
The Metropolitan Museum of Art's collection of African, Oceanian, and American art was transformed by the generous donation of Nelson A. Rockefeller, who founded The Museum of Primitive Art before gifting his more than 3,000-piece collection to the Met in 1969. Before Rockefeller's collection was gifted to the Met, Rockefeller founded The Museum of Primitive Art in New York City with the intention of displaying these works, after the Met had previously shown little interest in his art collection. The wing, named after Rockefeller's son Michael, who died while collecting works in New Guinea, opened to the public in 1982 and exhibits Non-Western works of art created from , present, including a wide range of particular cultural traditions. The collection ranges from 40,000-year-old indigenous Australian rock paintings, to a group of memorial poles carved by the Asmat people of New Guinea, to a priceless collection of ceremonial and personal objects from the Nigerian Court of Benin donated by Klaus Perls. In December 2021, the Met began its $70 million renovation of The Michael C. Rockefeller Wing, originally planned to begin in 2020 but now set for completion in 2024. The 40,000 square-feet renovation includes the reinstallation of an exterior glass curtain, which had deteriorated, as well as the galleries in their entirety, which house 3,000 works. This wing marked a shift in how the museum regarded non-Western art, moving from viewing objects as ethnographic work to judging them on aesthetic terms as art.
The Temple Of Dendur And The Egyptian Legacy
The Metropolitan Museum of Art's Egyptian collection is one of its most enduring attractions, centered around the Temple of Dendur, a large sandstone temple dismantled by the Egyptian government to save it from rising waters caused by the building of the Aswan High Dam. The temple was given to the United States in 1965 and assembled in a new wing at the Met in 1978, situated in a large room and partially surrounded by a reflecting pool and illuminated by a wall of windows opening onto Central Park. The collection includes more than 26,000 separate pieces of Egyptian art from the Paleolithic era through the Ptolemaic era, and almost all of them are on display in the museum's massive wing of 40 Egyptian galleries. Among the rarest pieces in the Met's Egyptian collection are 13 wooden models discovered in a tomb in the Southern Asasif in western Thebes in 1920, which depict, in unparalleled detail, a cross-section of Egyptian life in the early Middle Kingdom. William the Faience Hippopotamus is a miniature that has become the informal mascot of the museum, and other notable items include the Chair of Reniseneb, the Lotiform Chalice, and the Metternich Stela. The first curator was Albert Lythgoe, who directed several Egyptian excavations for the museum, and since 2013 the curator has been Diana Craig Patch. In 2018, the museum built an exhibition around the golden-sheathed 1st-century BCE coffin of Nedjemankh, a high-ranking priest of the ram-headed god Heryshaf of Heracleopolis, which was returned to Egypt after being stolen in 2011.
The European Paintings And The Wrightsman Gift
The Metropolitan Museum of Art's collection of European paintings has grown to more than 2,625 works of art from the thirteenth through the early twentieth century, with the Wrightsman paintings considered the highest in overall quality and condition. The collection began when 174 paintings were purchased from European dealers in 1871, and almost two-thirds of these paintings have been deaccessioned, but quality paintings by Jordaens, Van Dyck, Poussin, the Tiepolos, and Guardi remain in the collection. Major gifts from Henry Gurdon Marquand in 1889, 1890 and 1891 gave the Met a much more solid foundation, and his example helped to create a taste for collecting Old Master paintings. In 1913, the Benjamin Altman bequest had sufficient range and depth to put the Met's collection of paintings on the map, and in 1949, the Jules Bache gift added more great paintings. The Robert Lehman Collection, which came to the museum in 1975, included many significant paintings, and is particularly strong in early Renaissance material. Over a period of decades, Charles and Jayne Wrightsman donated 94 works of unusually high quality to the Department of European Paintings, the last of which came with Mrs. Wrightsman's bequest in 2019. The Wrightsmans collected expertise as well as art, and advanced technology made better choices possible. Additionally, the Wrightsmans had the Met's curators at their disposal, for whom they served as a virtual auxiliary purchase fund for objects the Met curators coveted, but could not afford.
The Costume Institute And The Met Gala
The Costume Institute, originally founded as the Museum of Costume Art by Aline Bernstein and Irene Lewisohn, merged with The Metropolitan Museum of Art in 1946 and became a curatorial department in 1959. Today, its collection contains more than 35,000 costumes and accessories, and the institute is known for hosting the annual Met Gala, an extremely popular, if exclusive, event in the fashion world. In 2007, the 700 available tickets started at $6,500 per person, and the Costume Institute's annual Benefit Gala is co-chaired by Vogue editor-in-chief Anna Wintour. The institute used to have a permanent gallery space in what was known as the Basement area of the Met because it was downstairs at the bottom of the Met facility, but due to the fragile nature of the items in the collection, the Costume Institute does not maintain a permanent installation. Instead, every year it holds two separate shows in the Met's galleries using costumes from its collection, with each show centering on a specific designer or theme. Exhibits displayed over the past decade in the Costume Institute include Rock Style, in 1999, representing the style of more than 40 rock musicians, including Madonna, David Bowie, and the Beatles, and Extreme Beauty: The Body Transformed, in 2001, which exposes the transforming ideas of physical beauty over time and the bodily contortion necessary to accommodate such ideals and fashion. On the 14th of January 2014, the Met named the Costume Institute complex after Anna Wintour, and the curator is Andrew Bolton.
The Modern And Contemporary Wing
The Metropolitan Museum of Art's modern and contemporary art collection, with some 13,000 artworks, primarily by European and American artists, occupies a significant portion of the museum's gallery space and contains many iconic modern works. Cornerstones of the collection include Picasso's portrait of Gertrude Stein, Jasper Johns's White Flag, Jackson Pollock's Autumn Rhythm (Number 30), and Max Beckmann's triptych Beginning. In April 2013, it was reported that the museum was to receive a collection worth $1 billion from cosmetics tycoon Leonard Lauder, which included work by Pablo Picasso, Georges Braque and Juan Gris and went on display in 2014. The Met has since added to the collection, for example spending $31.8 million for Gris' The musician's table in 2018. From 2016 to 2020, the museum operated a modern and contemporary art gallery at 945 Madison Avenue, a Marcel Breuer-designed building at Madison Avenue and 75th Street in Manhattan's Upper East Side, the former Whitney Museum of American Art. In September 2018, it was announced that the Met intended to vacate the Met Breuer three years early, in 2020, and the Frick Collection began occupying the space while the main building underwent renovations. In November 2021, the Met received a $125 million donation from Oscar L. Tang and Agnes Hsu-Tang, the largest gift in the museum's history, and in exchange, the Met named its modern and contemporary art galleries after the Tangs. Mexican architect Frida Escobedo was hired in March 2022 to renovate the Tang Wing, and the Met had raised $550 million for the Tang Wing by 2024.
The Financial And Cultural Challenges
The Metropolitan Museum of Art has faced significant financial and cultural challenges in the 21st century, including financial setbacks related to servicing its outstanding debts and associated cut-backs in staffing at the museum. In September 2016, The Wall Street Journal first reported financial set-backs at the museum, and in April 2017, The New York Times reported that the Met's annual debt was approaching $40 million, in addition to an outstanding museum bond for $250 million. This resulted in the indefinite postponement of a planned $600 million architectural expansion of the exhibition space for the museum's modern art collection. In January 2018, museum president Daniel Weiss announced that the century-old policy of free admission would be replaced by a $25 charge to out-of-state and foreign visitors, effective March 2018. The museum temporarily closed in March 2020 during the COVID-19 pandemic in New York City, and reopened in late August, which was the first time in over a century that the Met was closed for more than three consecutive days. In September 2020, following debates surrounding provenance holes and mismanagement of Indigenous art, the museum appointed Patricia Marroquin Norby as the museum's inaugural Associate Curator of Native American Art. In May 2021, the museum installed a plaque on its Fifth Avenue facade in recognition of indigenous communities and of the fact that the museum is situated in what was historically Lenapehoking. In 2024, several protests targeted the Met during the Israel-Gaza war, citing board members' investments in RTX and a lack of public comment around destruction of cultural heritage during the war.