- Isabella Stewart Gardner
- The Clark Art Institute
- The Getty Villa in Malibu
- Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum
- The Frick Collection
What is so unique about this museum is the building itself. It has the look and feel of a Venetian palace with windows overlooking an inner courtyard surrounded by a 12th century cloister. The art collection includes a Self Portrait by Rembrandt and a portrait of Mrs. Gardner by John Singer Sargent. In the 80's, several of the museum's paintings including a Rembrandt were stolen. Some of these were recovered in recent years.
The museum is located at 280 The Fenway in Boston. Closed Mondays except certain holidays falling on a Monday.
The Clart Art Institute
The Berkshires is one of the most beautiful places in the U.S. Lush with trees and green hills, you pass small, sleepy towns that seem untouched by the hectic pace of the world around it. At Williamstown, you are immediately attracted by the calm and restful appeal of the town. Its intimacy draws you. This is why it is so surprising to find a museum of the caliber of the Clark Art Institute. Sterling and Francine Clark collected many Impressionist paintings of which thirty-five are by Renoir.
The museum is located at 225 South St., Williamstown, Massachusetts.
The Getty Villa in Malibu
The Getty Villa is built in the style of a Roman country home and housed the entire collection of the Getty museum until the opening of the new museum, the Getty Center, in Los Angeles. Currently closed for renovation, it will reopen with an exhibition dedicated solely to Greek and Roman art. I visited the Villa at the height of the controversy over the acquisition of a Greek kouros. Many believed that this kouros was merely a copy. It did look as if it was "completed yesterday" when I saw it. And no restoration could have done that! I wonder if this will be included in the collection when it reopens.
The museum is located above Pacific Coast Highway in Malibu.
Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum in New York City
The circular building was designed by Frank Lloyd Wright to house a modern art collection. The building, a statement of what is "modern", reflects the collection within. True to form, the spiraling ramp leads you from one floor to the next as you slowly walk up and enjoy the art displayed along the ramp, a "stroll through art" as described by the historian, Bruno Zevi.
The museum is located at 1071-5th Avenue at 89th Street in New York City.
The Frick Collection
Echoing the affluence of 5th Avenue is the mansion housing the Frick Collection. This was the residence of Henry Clay Frick, a Pittsburgh steel industrialist, who bequeathed the mansion and his art collection to a Board of Trustees to perpetrate the collection and form a center for art studies. It has a colorful garden along 5th Avenue. Inside the museum are precious works by Rembrandt, Velasquez, Goya and a rare Van Eyck, among others.
The museum is located at 1 East 70th Street (between Madison and 5th) in New York City.
