Thomas Hoving, the former director (1967-77) of the Metropolitan Museum of Art has died. He transformed the museum by, among other things, introducing the “blockbuster” show. The King Tut exhibit was the first of such shows, now a staple in museum exhibition calendars. Mr. Hoving was only 35 when he took over as the director…
The Norton Simon Museum of Art in Pasadena has announced that Jean-Auguste-Dominique Ingres’s Comtesse d’Haussonville (1845) has arrived on loan from The Frick Collection in New York. The portrait, the first loan from the Frick in an art exchange program between the two institutions, will be exhibited October 30, 2009–January 25, 2010. The loan is also…
Highlights from the The Iraq Museum in Baghdad can now be viewed online at The Virtual Museum of Iraq. The “halls” are organized by period and offer historical and geographical background as well as sculptures and decorative objects. Objects can be explored both by description and visually via multiple views or a QTVR. Some objects…
The Van Gogh Museum in Amsterdam, in conjunction with the Huygens Institute, has digitized all 902 known letters written by and to Vincent van Gogh. You can do a keyword search as well as search by period, correspondent, place, or those with sketches. While you can view a scan of each letter, the site also…