LONDON - The Royal Academy of Arts is celebrating the centenary of the birth of Paul Mellon (1907 –1999), one of the greatest collectors of British art, with an exhibition of major works from the Paul Mellon Collection at the Yale Center for British Art. The exhibition will present more than 150 works, including prints, drawings, paintings, rare books and manuscripts. On exhibition through 27 January, 2008.

Featured in the exhibition are many objects that have not been seen by the British public since they were purchased, as well as major works by artists such as Reynolds, Gainsborough, Stubbs, Constable and Turner. This will be an unparalleled opportunity to experience some of the finest works of British art.

Paul Mellon was born in 1907, into one of the most powerful banking families in the US. Together with the fellow Pittsburgh families of Carnegie and Frick, the Mellon family shared a strong commitment to public philanthropy. Paul Mellon’s interest in British culture ranged from horse breeding and racing to building the most significant private collection of British art outside the United Kingdom. Mellon’s passion for British painting began in 1936 with his purchase of Stubbs’ Pumpkin with a Stable-lad. From 1959, with the help of English art historians Basil Taylor and John Baskett, he amassed a collection of British art from the fifteenth to the early twentieth century. He bequeathed the majority of this collection to Yale University in 1966 to establish the Yale Center for British Art. Housed in the last building designed by the American architect Louis I. Kahn, which opened in 1977, the Center was complimented by the establishment in 1970 of the Paul Mellon Centre for Studies in British Art in London. The Yale Center for British Art now comprises approximately 50,000 prints and drawings, 2,000 paintings, several hundred pieces of sculpture, and 35,000 rare books and manuscripts from Mellon’s collection.

The exhibition includes early Americana and exceptional rare books and manuscripts including works by William Blake. Works range in scale from miniatures by Hilliard and small-scale works on paper to large-scale oil paintings. The representative collection of great British watercolours includes paintings by JR Cozens, Thomas Girtin, Richard Parkes Bonington and Paul Sandby. The oil Supported by paintings featured comprise works by Reynolds, Gainsborough, Constable, Canaletto, Hogarth, and Turner’s outstanding marine painting, Dort or Dordrecht: The Dort Packet-Boat from Rotterdam Becalmed, which will be seen in the UK for the first time since it was purchased in 1966.

 The exhibition will illuminate Mellon’s remarkable vision in creating an institution in North America that serves both as a public museum of British art and as a research institute. On his death in 1999 Mellon left important bequests to major British institutions, this included the Royal Academy of Arts.

An American’s Passion for British Art: Paul Mellon’s Legacy has been organised by the Royal Academy of Arts and Yale Center for British Art. The exhibition has been curated by Brian Allen, Director of Studies, Paul Mellon Centre for Studies in British Art, London; John Baskett, friend and art advisor to Paul Mellon; and MaryAnne Stevens, Acting Secretary and Senior Curator, Royal Academy of Arts, in association with curators at the Yale Center for British Art.

The Bank of New York Mellon Corporation is generously supporting An American’s Passion for British Art: Paul Mellon’s Legacy. The Royal Academy of Arts welcomes this new relationship and is delighted to be working with the Bank of New York Mellon Corporation at this exciting time.

"The exhibition is a reflection of our passion for supporting the Arts as well as a perspective on a period of great importance to British painting. We are delighted to be supporting the Royal Academy of Arts and this celebration of British art," said Helena Morrissey and William Kerr, Co-chairs of the Corporation's European Region.

The Bank of New York Mellon Corporation is a global financial services company and leading provider of financial services for institutions, corporations and high-net-worth individuals, the Corporation operates in 37 countries serving more than 100 markets. It has more than $18 trillion in assets under custody and administration and $1 trillion in assets under management.

A handsome exhibition catalogue with 336 pages and 370 colour illustrations has been co-published by the Yale Center for British Art and the Royal Academy of Arts, in association with Yale University Press. Through its five essays and numerous catalogue entries, the publication charts the creation and growth of the Center’s collections and considers how they reflect and actively contribute to the understanding and promotion of British visual culture in America. The authoritative team of authors behind the catalogue includes John Baskett, former art advisor to Paul Mellon; Jules David Prown, Paul Mellon Professor Emeritus of the History of Art, Yale University, and founding director of the Yale Center for British Art; Duncan Robinson, Director of the Fitzwilliam Museum, Cambridge, and former director of the Yale Center for British Art; Brian Allen, Director of Studies at the Paul Mellon Centre for Studies in British Art, London; and William S. Reese, President of William Reese Company, New Haven.

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