Finally! After 3 years of being off the map, one of the foremost collections and exhibition spaces for works on paper in the US is back. The newly renamed Morgan Library and Museum (formerly The Pierpont Morgan Library) is set to reopen this Saturday, April 29, 2006.
I’ve been to number of exhibitions of master drawings at the Morgan over the years and they have all been memorable. The Library itself, developed from the private library of financier and all-around-rich-guy Pierpont Morgan, has a terrific collection of old master drawings, as well as historic manuscripts, books, bindings, music notation, Near Eastern scrolls, tablets and other art objects.
The museum, which is located on Madison Ave. at 36th Street in New York (entrance on 36th), has undergone its most extensive renovation ever with new gallery space, four story court, cafe and auditorium, as well as an unfortunately inappropriate new Bauhausian entrance structure, but that’s a minor quibble.
The Library and Museum will debut its dramatically expanded exhibition space with a show of treasures from its own holdings: Masterworks from the Morgan, which runs from April 29 to July 2, 2006. And treasures they are. Old Pierpont had pretty good taste in master drawings (image above, clockwise from top-left: Rembrandt, Delacroix, Watteau, Goya, Rubens).
The Morgan also has a renovated web site which allows you to look through some of the drawings and other artifacts and, like the same feature on the Met’s site, zoom way in on them.
Link via Artnet News.
