Metropolitan
Museum of Art
The Met, is a world famous art museum that sits
on the eastern side of Central Park, along what is called
"Museum Mile" in New York City, with a permanent collection that
contains over 2 million works of art that has been divided into
nineteen curatorial departments, with the main building called,
the Met, houses one of the world's biggest art galleries, there
is a smaller second locale called the Cloisters, in Upper
Manhattan that contains medieval artworks. This fabulous
permanent collection contains artworks from classical antiquity
and ancient Egypt, extensive holdings of Islamic, African,
Byzantine, Asian and Ocean art, paintings and sculptures from
almost all the European masters and a very inclusive collection
of modern and American art, with an encyclopedic collection of
costumes and accessories, musical instruments, armor and antique
weapons from across the globe. The museum was founded in 1870 by
a group of Americans, that included artists and thinkers of the
day, businessman and financiers, who wanted to open a museum
that would bring art and art education to the American people,
opening in 1872, on Fifth Avenue. By 2007, the Met measured
about a quarter mile long and housed over 2 million square feet
of space filled with the wonders and treasures of the world.
Their permanent collections are kept in 17 curatorial
departments, as well as four dedicated conservation departments
and a department of scientific research. Their American
decorative arts department houses some 12,000 examples of
decorative artworks from the late 17th century to the early
20th, with a spectacular collection of American stained glass,
with examples from Tiffany, LaFarge, William Jay Bolton and
Henry E. Sharp, and a marvelous silver collection with pieces
from Paul Revere and Tiffany. Other outstanding collections
includes; the American sculpture and paintings, Ancient Near
Eastern art, Asian art, Arms and Armor, Arts of Africa, the
Americas and Oceania, Costume Institute, Egyptian art, Drawings
and prints, Islamic art, European paintings, European sculpture
and decorative arts, Greek and Roman art and the Robert Lehman
collection.
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