The Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum

16 May 2019

After our time in New York, we took the train to Boston.  This is a really pretty train ride through parts of rural New York, Connecticut, and Massachusetts.  Much of the route runs along the coast, with picturesque towns and boat harbors, as well as historic buildings made of stone or brick.  Having spent half my life in the US on the west coast, I sometimes forget that many communities on the east coast are really old!

We went to Boston for a family wedding, and it was lovely.  But family events tend to not be as interesting to those not in the family, so suffice it to say that Richard's family is warm, funny, interesting - always fun to catch up with cousins we rarely see, and meet new cousins.  (It's a really big family.)

We took one day to be a little touristy.  Richard opted out, but his brother, sister-in-law, and I decided a museum visit would be perfect.  They wanted to go to the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum, and this was absolutely the perfect choice!

A little history:  Isabella Stewart was a New Yorker, born in 1840, who married a Bostonian, John "Jack" Lowell Gardner Jr. in 1860.  They were well-off financially and travelled extensively - and when Isabella's father passed away, her left her his fortune.  She and her husband began collecting art with a passion, to the point that they needed a building to house the massive collection.  They started planning a building, but Jack passed away in 1898.  Isabella bought land in the Fenway area of Boston, and hired an architect.  However, she insisted that the building be built to her specifications, which were based on the idea of creating a Venetian palazzo (palace) right there in Boston.  Ms. Gardner called her museum Fenway Court, and opened it in 1903.

Here's their website:  www.gardnermuseum.org

There is now a new building which houses special exhibits.  But the main collection is exhibited in The Palace, the original building.  It really is incredible, and I felt transported to Venice (minus the canals).  Really, this is a four storey structure built around a central courtyard, which features an ancient Roman mosaic of Medusa, scattered Greek and Roman kore (statues of young women - male statues are kouros), some sarcophagi, and most amazing to me, an Egyptian statue of Horus, the falcon-headed god (although this was just the falcon).  The courtyard is covered in glass, so it's protected from the elements while allowing natural light in.  It's like a secret garden, full of tree ferns and purple or white flowers, and scattered white marble statuary.  Definitely from another era, another place and time.  

The keyhole windows and arched windows are straight out of Renaissance Venice, and allow visitors to look down onto the courtyard from every level.

And the artwork!!!!  It always amazes me that private collectors and private museums own such famous masterpieces!!!  John Singer Sargent, James McNeill Whistler, several Renaissance artists, a couple of French Impressionists, a Rembrandt or four - it goes on and on!!!  

I always find it incredible to be in the presence of such art.  There's art, and then there's art, you know?  Many people can paint, and paint well.  But there's a reason that certain painters are considered masters, and when you'd in front of one of their paintings or sculptures, you really can feel the difference between good and great art.  

For example, Sandro Botticelli.  Here's a photo of his "Virgin and Child."  Not the greatest photo.  (No flash allowed.)  But look at the transparency of Mary's veil, and everyone's halos.  Look at the delicacy of her skin and hair, how Mary has almost an inner glow.  The shading and draping of the clothing, Mary's hand reaching for the gift, the baby Jesus waving his hand somewhat playfully, somewhat in a blessing sort of gesture.  The painting is just luminous, and alive - it almost feels as if we're right there with living, breathing people.

That's what I mean about a masterpiece.  There's a power that lives in a masterpiece, a piece of the artist that is still alive these centuries later.  A power that draws us into the painting, that makes the painting shine and sing and stand out from all the other paintings in the room or even in the building.

And this building was FULL of master-pieces!!!  Really, it was almost over-whelming!!!  And we didn't even have time to see it all!!!

There were several pieces by Luca della Robbia, a Renaissance sculptor from Florence who made the most gorgeous altars as well as relief sculptures still found in churches and chapels throughout Italy.  He worked in terracotta clay, using a limited palette of glazes to color his sculptures.  della Robbias are much more detailed than other sculptors of the time, with finer detailing and handling of the clay, so that it almost looks like carved and polished stone.  Again, incredible, amazing, beautiful masterpieces!!!!

And Rembrandt!  How can anyone NOT love this self-portrait of a young Rembrandt?  (I think he was about 23 when he painted it.)

But this brings us to the sad side of the Gardner Museum, and one of the reasons it's a well-known collection.  In 1990, two thieves dressed as policemen entered the Gardner and stole a total of 13 pieces of art.  The pieces stolen included Vermeer's "The Concert," valued at more than $500 million at the time.  Other pieces stolen were by Rembrandt, Manet, and Degas.  Plus one piece by a less well-known artist, Govaert Flinck.  In all, eight paintings and five works on paper were stolen, and they've never been seen again.  As the museum says on their website, this remains the biggest unsolved art theft in world history.  

Two of the empty frames still hang in the Dutch Room, a testament to the art that once was housed their.  Yes, the thieves cut the paintings on canvas right out of the frames - it's much easier to transport a rolled canvas rather than a framed picture.

Here's the museum's website on the theft:  www.gardnermuseum.org/about/theft

When we talked about visiting the Gardner, I remembered a mystery I had read, which included the story of this theft.  For anyone who enjoys a good mystery, well written and with plenty of detail about the artwork, the book is "The Flinck Connection" by Estelle Ryan.  The series is wonderful, well-researched and as I said, very well written.  A link to the book at her website:  http://estelleryan.com/the-flinck-connection.html

The museum was closing early for their yearly gala, so we didn't see everything.  

And a quirky fact - if your name is Isabella, you get in to the museum for FREE!!!  (So do veterans, active duty military, and Bank of America cardholders.  So be prepared if you meet any of those criteria.)

It really was fabulous.  We agreed that we'd like to go back for a longer visit.  Well, at least two of us would like to do so.

Extra large photos follow.

The courtyard, and the Roman mosaic with Medusa in the center.  (And how did they ship it from Europe???)

Painting "The Coronation of Hebe," 1580s, by Paolo Veronese and workshop.  Oil on panel (on the ceiling.)

Painting "El Jaleo," 1882, by John Singer Sargent.  Oil on canvas.

 
The ceramic floor tiles in the second floor galleries.

And even the bathroom was artistic!!!!