Cleveland Museum of Art to Showcase Renowned Antiquities Collections

Written by Casper Winchester Sunday, 16 May 2010 20:39

CLEVELAND, OH.- After a five-year hiatus, the Cleveland Museum of Art (CMA) collections from the ancient Near East, Greece, Rome, Egypt and Africa, as well as works from Late Antiquity, the Byzantine Empire and the European Middle Ages, will return to public view on June 26. The new presentation will trace the evolution of the visual and cultural traditions at the roots of Western civilization and foster an understanding of the ritual, social and historical contexts within which these works of art were produced. At the same time, visitors will be encouraged to explore connections to art from other periods on view throughout the museum.

The works will be showcased in 17 newly renovated galleries, which also include dedicated spaces for the museum’s holdings of prints and drawings, in the first level of the museum’s original Beaux-Arts building, designed by Hubbell and Benes. Their unveiling will mark the next milestone in a multi-phase renovation and expansion, scheduled for completion in 2013. The project is designed by architect Rafael Viñoly and will add 200,000 square feet to the museum. Last summer, the museum celebrated the opening of the first of three new wings, a structure that unites the original building with a 1971 expansion by Marcel Breuer.

The New Galleries
Two sets of stairs lead visitors from the upper-level galleries of European and American art (reopened in 2008) down to a foyer that showcases the life-size bronze statue of the Apollo Sauroktonos attributed to Praxiteles, one of the most influential Greek artists of the Classical period. From that entry point, a chronological narrative will unfold over a 16,000-square-foot suite of galleries. Within each historical area, objects will be organized thematically to foster awareness of — and promote insights into — their function and meaning for the cultures that produced them.

“The remarkable works that will be displayed in these galleries were critical to the development of the visual arts as we know them,” says Griffith Mann, chief curator of the Cleveland Museum of Art. “Our goal has been to showcase the artistic achievements of ancient cultures to their best advantage and, at the same time, integrate these objects as part of the greater museum experience.”

For the first time, the museum’s sub-Saharan African collections will be displayed in spaces contiguous to the galleries of ancient Egyptian art so that the works produced on the African continent can be seen and studied together. Surrounding galleries are connected by larger cultural and historical arcs, allowing visitors to move from the burgeoning civilizations of the ancient Near East to the seafaring culture of the Greek world and the rise of the Roman empire, which adopted and reinvented the artistic and religious traditions of its predecessors.

The new first-level galleries will feature approximately 900 works acquired from the museum’s charter days in the early 20th century through to the present. Highlights include:

• Statuette of a Woman: The Stargazer, c. 3000 BC, probably from Anatolia, the Asian part of modernday Turkey, the earliest sculpture of the human figure in the museum;
• Winged Genie Pollinating Date Palm, 883-859 BC, Iraq, Nimrud, Assyrian, reign of Ashurnasirpal II, speaks of the large numbers of prisoner-slaves who built the vast palace that served as the original setting of the relief, recently cleaned and conserved for the installation;
• The Emperor as Philosopher, probably Marcus Aurelius (reigned AD 161-180), c. 175-200, Turkey, Roman, among the finest large bronze sculptures to have survived the Greco-Roman age;
• The Jonah Marbles, c. 280-290, Asia Minor, probably Phrygia (Central Turkey), Early Christian, a unique sculptural ensemble believed to have been unearthed together and known for its quality and excellent condition;
• Statue of Heqat, the Frog Goddess, c. 3050-2900 BC, Egypt, Predynastic Period, Late Naqada III Period to Early Dynastic Period, Early Dynasty 1 (2950-2573 BC), marks the beginning of the great tradition of animal sculpture in Egyptian art;
• Icon of the Virgin and Child, 500s, Egypt, Byzantine period, a unique surviving Coptic tapestry;
• Apollo Sauroktonos (Lizard-Slayer), c. 350-275 BC; attributed to Praxiteles, the only known life-size bronze version of the Apollo Sauroktonos, possibly viewed by Pliny the Elder in the first century AD and cited in his writings; and
• Staff of Office (kibango), late 1700s-early 1800s, Africa, Democratic Republic of the Congo, Luba peoples, one of the Luba King’s most important royal attributes.

CMA’s Renovation and Expansion
The opening of the first-level galleries marks the completion of CMA’s restoration of its original building. In 2008, the museum opened the upper-level galleries, culminating the first phase in the renovation and expansion project.

“The refurbished galleries will create a beautiful, Classical space perfectly married to our collections of antiquities and will allow visitors to see these works in a new light,” says CMA Interim Director Deborah Gribbon. “Although this moment finds us looking back in history to our cultural and artistic foundations, it is the next step in a program that will transform the Cleveland Museum of Art.”

When the building project is completed, the facility will include the museum’s two fully renovated architectural landmarks, the 1916 Beaux-Arts building and Breuer’s 1971 addition with its distinctive façade of alternating light and dark grey granite stripes, as well as Viñoly’s two new striped marble and granite wings on the east and west sides of the complex. Each ending in a dramatic glass-box gallery, the wings will offer panoramic views of the museum’s park setting, as well as views into the museum galleries and conservation studios. A third new 39,000-square-foot structure will form the north side of a large courtyard with a glass canopy crowning an atrium at the center of the complex.

The original Beaux-Arts building, widely acknowledged as one of the finest museum designs of the early 20th century, became peripheral and navigation through the galleries became increasingly challenging. Many parts of the complex were in need of extensive renovations. The capital project currently underway will transform the museum’s physical layout and infrastructure and significantly improve both the visitor experience and the storage and presentation of the collection. Visit : http://www.clevelandart.org/

---

Click on logo below to add this article to your favorite Social Website ~