Yale Center for British Art Celebrates Paul Mellon Centennial

Written by Joshua Gregory Thursday, 09 December 2010 22:54

New Haven, CT - This spring the Yale Center for British Art celebrates its thirtieth anniversary and commemorates the centennial of the birth of its founder, Paul Mellon (1907–1999; Yale College Class of 1929), with the special exhibition, Paul Mellon’s Legacy: A Passion for British Art.  Mr. Mellon was one of the greatest collectors and cultural philanthropists of the twentieth century.  His collection at the Yale Center is unquestionably the largest and most comprehensive representation of British art outside of the United Kingdom.  The exhibition will showcase nearly 250 treasures from the Paul Mellon Collection at the Center and will feature many works not often seen by the public. These include significant drawings and watercolors by William Hogarth, Thomas Rowlandson, William Blake, and J.M.W. Turner, as well as splendid rare books, manuscripts, maps, and atlases.  On Exhibition April 18–July 29, 2007.

In addition, important paintings and sculptures from the Paul Mellon Collection will be highlighted throughout the galleries of the Center’s landmark building designed by Louis Kahn.  The centennial celebration will be the first time since the Center’s opening in 1977 that the entire building has been devoted to the display of the Paul Mellon Collection.

In December 1966, Yale University announced that Paul Mellon was giving his outstanding collection of British art to the university.  Today, the Center’s holdings total approximately 2,000 paintings, 50,000 prints and drawings, 35,000 rare books and manuscripts, and several hundred pieces of sculpture.  Mr. Mellon also provided funds for a building to house the objects and an endowment to support the institution and ensure that public admission would always be free.  In his foreword to Selected Paintings, Drawings & Books (Yale Center for British Art, 1977), Paul Mellon expressed his hope that “the Center and its contents would attract undergraduate students, advanced scholars, struggling as well as established artists, and lovers of English art in general—not only for scholastic purposes but for pure enjoyment.”

Through a wide-ranging display, Paul Mellon’s Legacy will demonstrate Mr. Mellon’s unparalleled collecting activity in the field of British art. On the Center’s third floor, prints, drawings, rare books, and manuscripts from the fifteenth to the early twentieth century will be arranged chronologically, highlighting important themes in the history of British culture, such as early exploration and discovery, architecture, sport, travel, fashion, and natural history.  The exhibition will also celebrate Mr. Mellon’s remarkable vision in creating an institution in North America that serves both as a public museum for British art and as a research institute situated within one of the world’s great universities.

Throughout the year, the Centennial will be commemorated with a slate of exhibitions and programs at Yale University and beyond, including the National Gallery of Art in Washington, D.C., the Virginia Museum of Fine Arts in Richmond, the National Sporting Library in Middleburg, Virginia, the Harrison Institute and Small Special Collections Library at the University of Virginia in Charlottesville, as well as Tate Britain, the Royal Academy of Arts, Lowell Libson Ltd., and Hazlitt, Gooden & Fox in London, the Fitzwilliam Museum at the University of Cambridge, the Bodleian Library at Oxford University, and the State Hermitage Museum in St. Petersburg, Russia.

Following its premiere at Yale, a selection of approximately 150 masterpieces from Paul Mellon’s Legacy, including some of the Center’s greatest paintings, will travel to the Royal Academy of Arts, London, where they will be on view October 20, 2007–January 27, 2008. The Royal Academy is an ideal partner for the centennial exhibition since a large number of artists represented in the Paul Mellon Collection were Royal Academicians.  Paul Mellon was elected Honorary Corresponding Member of the Royal Academy in 1977.

Paul Mellon’s Legacy: A Passion for British Art has been coorganized by the Yale Center for British Art and the Royal Academy of Arts. 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 adviser to Paul Mellon; and MaryAnne Stevens, Acting Secretary and Senior Curator, Royal Academy of Arts, London; in collaboration the Center’s curatorial staff.

An exhibition catalogue, co-published by the Yale Center for British Art and the Royal Academy of Arts in association with Yale University Press, will accompany the exhibition.  The book will include essays by John Baskett; Jules Prown, 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 in Cambridge and former director of the Yale Center for British Art; Brian Allen; William S. Reese, President of William Reese Company, an antiquarian book firm; as well as catalogue entries by Center’s curatorial staff.

The Yale Center for British Art offers a year-round schedule of exhibitions and educational programs and also provides numerous opportunities for scholarly research, such as residential fellowships. Academic resources of the Center include the Reference Library and Photo Archive, Conservation Laboratory, and Study Room for examining prints, drawings, rare books, and manuscripts from the collection.  One of the Center’s greatest treasures is the building itself.  Opened to the public in 1977, the Center is the final building designed by architect Louis I. Kahn.  The structure integrates the dual functions of study center and gallery, while providing an elegant and dignified environment for viewing works of art.  The building stands across the street from Kahn’s first major commission, the Yale University Art Gallery (1953).  Visit Web site: www.yale.edu/ycba