Americas

[Visited: January 2024]

Talking to a local on my way to Boston, she advised me that I should not miss the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum. Her face lit up while talking about it, and I decided that I had to see what it was all about. Receiving a large inheritance when her father passed away, Isabella Stewart Gardner started buying art. When her husband died in 1898, she decided that her collection had to be shared. She hired the architect Willard T. Sears, and designed a building on a piece of land she bought in Fenway, in western Boston. It was modelled after a Venetian palace. In her will, Isabella Stewart Gardner stipulated that she wanted her collection to be available to the public for the rest of time. Walking from the Museum of Fine Arts, I see a rectangular building on Evans Way Park. I have arrived, and am curious to see what the museum holds.
I enter through a modern building which has been added to the museum some 20 years earlier. After buying my ticket and leaving my coat and bag, I walk through a glass corridor to the adjacent, original building. I enter a corridor, and on the left I see a courtyard with plants, statues and a central rectangular decorated floor. I immediately recognize the tall, narrow windows from my many visits to Venice. It is rather curious to see this on the other side of the Atlantic. Contrary to popular belief, the building was not transported from Venice, but built from scratch to resemble a 15th century Venetian palace. It is time to wander around and enjoy the collection. Mrs. Isabella Stewart Gardner clearly had a love for art, and had the means to acquire it in abundance (and even to make sue the museum would stay open for the public long after her death).
From the East Cloister, I enter to the Spanish Cloister. I see old limestone sculptures, windows, fragments of buildings, and a painting. Next to it, I find the Chinese loggia, which has several statues of Buddha. Outside, I see the Monk's Garden, which I find closed. The windows make the Chinese loggia the lightest room of the entire building. I walk through several smaller rooms: the Yellow and Blue Room, and the Vatichino. I see diverse paintings, from Matisse to less famous painters like Zorn. The Vatichino, or Little Vatican, doesn't hold religious art but a Japanese flag, watercolours, a Sudanese dagger she took from her visit to Egypt, a bronze sculpture of a jaguar, and other objects. I walk around the courtyard, and explore the other two floors of the museum. There are famous works, from Rembrandt, Vermeer, Titian, Michelangelo, Botticelli, Raphael, and others. There are complete stained glass windows in a rose. There are textiles, there is furniture, books, religious artefacts, ceramics, and more. The rooms are all quite dark, which gives the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum a cosy feel. It is as if the visitor is a guest in her private home. Which, in a way, we still are. After my visit (the exhibition section is closed), I make sure to have lunch at the restaurant of the museum, which the woman who advised me to come here suggested. I soon discover that she was right about the museum, and also about the restaurant. Thank you for the suggestion!

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Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum > United States > Americas

[Visited: January 2024]

Around the World in 80 Clicks

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