The Met Cloisters, the Museum's branch dedicated to the art and architecture of medieval Europe, is located on four acres overlooking the Hudson River in northern Manhattan's Fort Tryon Park. A Carolingian ivory, The Jaharis Lectionary, a Limoges plaque with angels, and a painted glass paten are among the masterworks added to the collection since 1999. Most recent at The Cloisters is the renovation of the Late Gothic Hall, completed in 2009, which included the conservation of windows from the Dominican monastery in Sens and the return to public view of a monumental tapestry from Burgos Cathedral.īoth collections continue to acquire works of art. In the Main Building these include new galleries for Byzantine Art and for Medieval Art up to 1300, funded by Mary and Michael Jaharis. In recent years, galleries in both locations have undergone dramatic renovations. The Cloisters building, designed by Charles Collens, the architect of New York City's Riverside Church, in a simplified medieval style, was formally dedicated on May 10, 1938. Rockefeller donated seven hundred acres to establish additional parkland along the New Jersey Palisades, ensuring that the view from across the Hudson River from The Cloisters remain unsullied. provided funds that made it possible for the Museum to acquire Barnard's collection and also financed the conversion of nearly sixty-seven acres of land into a public park to house the new building. In 1925 the American philanthropist and collector John D. However, he kept many pieces for himself and, upon returning to the United States, opened to the public a churchlike brick structure on Fort Washington Avenue filled with his collection-the first installation of medieval art of its kind in America. Barnard also served as a middleman between major Paris dealers and American clients. While working in rural France before World War I, Barnard supplemented his income by locating and selling medieval sculpture and architectural fragments that had made their way into the hands of local landowners over several centuries of political and religious upheaval. Much of the sculpture at The Cloisters was acquired by George Grey Barnard, a prominent American sculptor and avid collector of medieval art. Others who have contributed substantially to the collection include Michael Friedsam, George and Frederic Pratt, and Irwin Untermyer. More than 250 medieval objects came to the Museum from the banker and prodigious collector George Blumenthal in 1941. The collection has continued to grow through purchases, gifts, and bequests. Pierpont Morgan donated some two thousand medieval objects that had belonged to his father. Although the fledgling Metropolitan Museum acquired its first medieval object in 1873, the core of the collection in the Main Building was not formed until nearly fifty years later, in 1917, when the son of the financier and collector J.
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