|
Articles
For over one hundred and fifty years the V & A has been collecting furniture and displaying it alongside the other decorative arts in its major galleries, but until now it has never had a gallery focussed solely on furniture…
The new installation of the Grainger Gallery of Folk Art at the Art Institute of Chicago opened in August 2009 in a renovated gallery space that wraps around the historic Ryerson and Burnham library in the original 1893 building of…
Even in a long museum career, it is unusual to have the pleasure of working with the same objects more than once. I first met George M. and Linda H. Kaufman in the National Gallery of Art’s design studio in…
On the morning of May 11, 1972, fifty people gathered in the double-parlor of the Higginson House, an elegant Federal dwelling on Boston’s Beacon Hill that serves as the home of the Colonial Society of Massachusetts. The moment marked the…
A major exhibition of work by American artist Walter Gay (1856–1937) on display at the Henry Morrison Flagler Museum in Palm Beach, Florida, examines the life and work of an American artist who specialized in painting the sumptuous domestic interiors…
Last June, the Menil Collection (Fig. 1) in Houston, Texas, celebrated its twenty-fifth year as a public institution. Situated in Montrose, an inner-city enclave populated by residential blocks, the Menil houses the privately assembled collection of John and Dominique de…
At Drayton Hall, a historic site of the National Trust for Historic Preservation in Charleston, South Carolina, a museum interpreter, about sixty-five years old, welcomed a group of elementary school students to the site. She summarized the history of the…
Framed by the flickering flames of gaslight sconces, textured cast-glass door panels sparkle in the twilight, their magical glow hinting at the resplendent interior within. Possessing a marvel and passion for a time that New York has long since forgotten,…
Prominently situated on the shore of Newport Harbor in the historic Easton’s Point neighborhood, Hunter House (circa 1748) (Fig. 1) exhibits the work of craftsmen practicing in eighteenth-century Newport, Rhode Island. The collection demonstrates the quality and breadth of Rhode…
Newport, Rhode Island, retains more of the imprint of each successive era of American history, more thoroughly preserved, than anywhere else in the United States. The people who live here, and even those who just come to visit, seem to…
Winterthur, set on 980-acres in northern Delaware, is charged with the management, preservation, and interpretation of over 850,000 objects in the museum, garden, and library collections combined. But there is only one antique at Winterthur you may see driving around…
Despite worries on Wall Street and gridlock in Washington, 2012 was another good year for acquisitions at America’s major art museums. Around the country, many museums have not found donors to be “any less generous,” according to Terry Morello, vice-president…
If there is a downside to my otherwise terrific job as executive producer of PBS’s Antiques Roadshow, it’s that I want things—expensive things—that I never wanted before. My wish list is enormous because I’ve seen and touched the best. I…
When Henry Francis du Pont inherited his family’s country estate, Winterthur, in 1926, his newfound passion for collecting the best in early American architecture, antiques, and fine art found its ultimate expression. His desire to share that passion led to…
Among the most entertaining objects associated with alcohol consumption are those showing the humor often associated with drinking. As production costs for ceramics, glass, prints, and other objects gradually lowered during the 1700s, such items made “purely for fun” became…
Of the many fine artists who were drawn to Rhode Island’s Newport and Narragansett Bay region during the 1800s, perhaps no other has better captured the mercurial sea or “the miracle of color under a curving wave,”2 than William Trost…
“I don’t paint portraits; I paint people in their homes,” Edouard Vuillard (1868–1940) famously said. Wallpaper, lamps, blankets and shawls, musical instruments, books, and paintings were all clues that revealed the taste and character of his subjects, at home in…
During the post-whaling era of the 1870s–1890s, many prominent American artists were drawn to Nantucket for its antiquated charm and picturesque vistas. George Inness and William Trost Richards were among those who joined the ranks of Nantucket-descended talents such as…
“Egypt,” an idyllic hill farm situated in an isolated hollow high on the slopes of Red Mountain in Arlington, Vermont, served as home base for the artist Rockwell Kent (1882–1971) and his growing family from the summer of 1919 to…
The New-York Historical Society holds one of the finest collections of early American silver in the nation. A trove of nearly three thousand objects, it is remarkable for being composed almost entirely of silver donated by descendants of the original…
|
|
|
|
|
