This is my second visit to the Metropolitan Museum of Art. My first visit was as a freshmen in college for ART 1011 Art History I. I remember visiting specifically for the Egyptian and Greek exhibitions for this class. One of the most standout artwork was the “Venus of Willendorf” clay doll that was on display for a limited time period.
The”Met” is the largest art museum in the United States. With 6,953,927 visitors to its three locations in 2018, it was the third most visited art museum in the world. Its permanent collection contains over two million works, divided among seventeen different departments. The main building is located at 1000 Fifth Avenue, along the Museum Mile on the eastern edge of Central Park in Manhattan’s Upper East Side, which by area is one of the world’s largest art galleries. A much smaller second location, The Cloisters at Fort Tryon Park in Upper Manhattan (Inwood, west of Dyckman) contains an extensive collection of art, architecture, and artifacts from medieval Europe. On March 18, 2016, the museum opened its third location the Met Breuer museum along Madison Avenue on the Upper East Side, which features the museum’s modern and contemporary art programs. The Metropolitan Museum of Art was founded in 1870 for the purposes of opening a museum to bring art and art education to the American people. The Fifth Avenue building opened on February 20, 1872, at 681 Fifth Avenue.
After negotiations with the City of New York in 1871, the Met was granted the land between the East Park Drive, Fifth Avenue, and the 79th and 85th Street in Central Park. A red brick and stone “mausoleum” was designed by American architect Calvert Vaux and his partner Jacob Wrey Mould. Vaux’s ambitious building was not well received. The building’s High Victorian Gothic style being considered already “outdated” prior to completion, and the president of the Met considered the project “a mistake”. Within 20 years, a new architectural plan for “fixing” the Vaux building was already being executed. Since that time, many additions have been made, including the distinctive Beaux-Arts(French style) Fifth Avenue facade, Great Hall, and Grand Stairway. These were designed by architect Richard Morris Hunt, but completed by his son, Richard Howland Hunt in 1902 after his father’s death. The architectural sculpture on the facade is by Karl Bitter. The wings that completed the Fifth Avenue facade in the 1910s were designed by the McKim, Mead & White firm. The modernistic glass sides and rear of the museum are the work of Roche Dinkeloo. Kevin Roche has been the architect for the master plan and expansion of the museum for the past 42 years. He is responsible for designing all of its new wings and renovations including but not limited to the American Wing, Greek and Roman Court, and recently opened Islamic Wing. The Met measures almost 1⁄4-mile (400 m) long and with more than 2,000,000 square feet (190,000 m2) of floor space, more than 20 times the size of the original 1880 building. The museum building is a total of over 20 structures, most of which are not visible from the exterior. The City of New York owns the museum building and contributes utilities, heat, and some of the cost of guardianship. The Charles Engelhard Court of the American Wing features the facade of the Branch Bank of the United States, a Wall Street bank that was facing demolition in 1913.
In my personal views, I assess The Met as both a cultural and obviously an architectural landscape. The artworks from around the world contributes to the cultural part, while the long history of work the museum went through to get to its current state is amazing! I focused on the architect of the museum in this visit due to its history. Prior to doing my own research, I did not know the largest art museum was right here in New York City, and that it was the third most visited museum in the WORLD. This blows my mind as I pass by it frequently as I stroll by Central Park. It also makes me regret to not visiting it more often, as the price of admission went from pay what you wish to set prices.
