“It was wonderful for people to see all our pieces in a new configuration,” Cohn says. “It keeps things fresh.”
The museums are planning an exhibit highlighting the 19th century artwork of the Winthrop collection when it returns to Harvard next spring.
Bequeathed in 1943, the collection makes up a significant portion of the exhibits in the Fogg Art Museum and Arthur M. Sackler Museum’s Asian collection. It includes more than 4,000 pieces that span almost every collecting area of the museums, from early Chinese Art to French medieval sculpture.
“It’s really shaped the legacy of the Fogg,” says museum spokesperson Matthew Barone.
Winthrop, Class of 1886, began collecting art after his graduation. He gave his library to Harvard College, making his entire gift the largest of its kind to any university art museum in the country.
—Staff writer Kristi L. Jobson can be reached at jobson@fas.harvard.edu.