History of the Metropolitan Museum of  Art

My Highlights Tour of the Metropolitan Museum of Art begins at the “Clock” in the Main Hall where visitors assemble at the start of every guided tour. This is where I give my visitors a short introduction to the history of the Metropolitan Museum.

The Metropolitan Museum of Art was founded in the last quarter of the nineteenth century, at a time when Americans, particularly New Yorkers, were making vast sums of money in business and private enterprise. They were traveling frequently to Europe and becoming introduced to the world’s great art collections in Royal Palaces and felt that the time was ripe to found a museum in New York through which they might become better educated about Art and be able to acquire it for their own personal collections.

The construction of the Museum was started in 1870. Over the next decade, it slowly took shape according to the principles of Neo-Classical architectural design. Borrowing from the Classical architecture of Greece and Rome, this style is exemplified by broad staircases, grand halls, cupolas and domes, elegant arches and pillars in the Doric, Ionic and Corinthian styles. There is also a great deal of ornamental moulding to be seen particiularly along the grand staircase with its solid balustrades that lead to the second floor.  In which stairwell, one might also see some fabulous examples of stone carvings in bas-relief.

Over the next 130 years, the Museum expanded rapidly as its impressive collection grew. As architects in the twentieth century envisioned the museum, its design became far more Modernist, indeed even Futuristic. The newer sections in the museum certainly reflect this changing archictectural aesthetic and we shall pause to reflect on the interior spaces as we move through the museum’s various sections. Today we have 13 square miles of gallery space and at least 3 million objects on display at any given time. We also place on display significant items for a limited time from the world’s other art museums during our special exhibitions and often loan out parts of our collection to traveling exhibits overseas. The museum is fully equipped with its own libraries that offer endless research possibilities for art historicans, scholars and curators and a large number of education programs exist to better inform the general public about the fascinating world of Art and Collecting.

The flower arrangement in the center of the Main Hall and the four supplementary arrangements that flank it come to us as a  lifetime’s endowment from the Lila Acherson Wallace Foundation and the Readers Digest Corporation. For as long as the museum stands, we will continue to receive the money that permits us to change the arrangement once a week on Monday when the museum is closed to the public. The arrangements superbly reflect the changing seasons through the ingenious use of flowers and foliage.

Come with me now on a tour of some of the most prestigious items in the Metropolitan Museum’s permanent collection.

Click here to get to the European Paintings section to see The Death of Socrates by Jacques-Louis David.

The Death of Socrates

THE DEATH OF SOCRATES—JACQUES-LOUIS DAVID
Researched by Rochelle Almeida

31.45
Artist: Jacques-Louis David (French 1748-1825)
Oil on Canvas
51 X 77 ¼ in.
France, 1787

What is the Story Depicted in the Painting:
It features, as its central character, the Greek philosopher Socrates (469-399 BCE), who was accused by the Athenian government of denying the gods and corrupting the young. Imprisoned by the authorities, Socrates was offered the choice of recanting his teachings or accepting the finality of death by swallowing a cup of hemlock. David depicts Socrates at the moment of his death, calmly accepting the poison that will put an end to his life, but continuing with his last breath to stand steadfastly by his convictions as he preaches to his attendant disciples. The execution took place at the Agora jail in 399 BC at the end of a long day that Socrates had spent discussing the immortality of the soul with his disciples.
Who was the artist?
This arresting oil on canvas was painted in 1787 by Jacques-Louis David, considered the foremost French painter immediately prior to the French Revolution. The fact that it depicts the consequences of standing up for one’s beliefs and was completed a mere two years before the outbreak of the French Revolution, has led critics to assume that it contains a propagandist motive and that David was suggesting how important it was to fearlessly stand up for what one believed to be right.  When the French Revolution broke out, individual principles would indeed be severely tested against the popular views of the bourgeoisie.
Socrates’ Stance:
There has been a great amount of comment on the figure of Socrates and the stance in which David has portrayed him.  Not only is he the central figure on the canvas, but with one hand, he reaches out to accept the cup of poison, while the other hand is held up in the gesture of a preacher. This denotes that even at the moment of death, he was unafraid about espousing his teachings and did not flinch from its finality. The hand gesture suggests that Socrates was asking his disciples whether or not he should make a libation to the gods out of the cup. In other words, he suggests that perhaps he ought to pray to the gods for a safe journey into Hades.
David had several sources of inspiration for the depiction of Socrates.  But, overall, he has painted him magnificently in Neo-Classical style, with every detail of his anatomy quite splendidly portrayed. In the time of ancient Greece, what we call the Classical Period, statues were depicted as expression of human perfection.  Therefore, they were idealized in the magnificence of their anatomical details.  The eighteenth century borrowed this ideology and philosophy of aesthetic perfection from the Greeks and reproduced it in their works of art.  Therefore, their revival of this style was called the New Classical or Neo-Classical and David was one of its most well known exponents. Thus, Socrates is portrayed as a heroic nude. Though his intention was obviously to remain realistic, David seems to have gone overboard in painting the anatomy of Socrates with such perfection (bulging biceps, firm taut abs!) for the philosopher was an old man during this stage in his life and could hardly have been so well endowed physically! But, his muscular torso resembles statues of Greek heroes and athletes, thereby symbolizing Socrates great moral strength and virtue.
Visual and Aesthetic Elements:
The figure of Socrates seems to divide the canvas in half.  On the left side, one sees shades of darkness and gloom.  Characters are only dimly portrayed.  The grieving group ascending the stairs in the background is said to be led by Xantepe, Socrates’ wife, who has just bid her husband farewell.  The darkness of this side could symbolize the loss of knowledge that the world would endure after Socrates died. On the right side of the canvas, more color dominates in the garments of the mourning disciples, though these colors too are ‘greyed’, symbolizing their subdued mood on the death of their teacher.
One is struck by the realistic detail of the composition. Notice the cold dampness of the walls and floor of the dungeon depicted through the use of gloomy grey.  Notice the raw redness of the bare feet of Socrates and his attendants, as also the bulging calves and the protruding veins on their legs and feet.  As if to confirm that he is indeed in a dungeon, we see the shackles that have just been removed from his feet and the bars at the high windows.
Secondary Figures:
The group of disciples on the right side of the canvas is also very striking.  They are seen openly mourning the death of their beloved master.  David makes their distress clear by depicting them as clinging for strength to one another, wailing openly and breaking into tears.  One is struck by their rather elderly appearance, but then one realizes that the Greeks did not waste education on youth—or indeed on women!  They are sorry to see their teacher go, but are powerless to prevent his death.  David has portrayed them dressed in the garments of the Classical Greek period.
As a contrast, at the foot of the bed sits Plato, dispassionate and composed.  He seems to have learned well from his master that one has to accept with serenity the inevitable—that which cannot be cured, must be endured. Plato, Socrates’ best-known disciple was born in 427 BC, so he would have been only 28 years old at the time of Socrates’ death.  However, he is deliberately portrayed as greyed and elderly to symbolize his traumatic suffering and his silent grief.  His pensive silence denotes his profound, melancholic meditation.  Socrates’ last moments on earth are known to us through the pen of Plato.
General and Concluding Comments:
David believed that art should portray life as closely as possible and so there are no brush strokes at all to suggest that this might be a painting.  This explains why the picture was an immense success at the Salon of 1787 (Cantinelli).
BIBLIOGRAPHY
Bailey, Colin B.  The Loves of the Gods:  Mythological Paintings from Watteau to David, New York, 1992, pp. 509-510.
Cantinelli, R.  Jacques-Louis David 1748-1825. 1930, pp. 24, 104.
Holma, K.  David:  Son Evolution et Son Style. 1940, pp. 50.
Kimmelman, Michael.  “At the Met with Leon Golub and Nancy Spero”.  New York Times (January 5, 1966), p. C5.
Mantz, P.  Exposition en faveur de l’oeuvre des Alsaciens et Lorrains, Gaz, des B-A, per. 2, X, 1874, pp. 200-202.
Robin, l’A.  L’Ami des artistes au sallon, 1787, p. 36-38.
Rosenblum, R. Transformations in Late Eighteenth Century Art, 1967, pp. 73-76, 103, 125.
Rousseau, T, Jr. “A Guide to the Picture Galleries”, M.M.A. Bulletin, XII, part 2, January 1954, pp 6, 45.
Sterling, C. A Catalogue of French Paintings XV-XVIII Centuries, M.M.A. 1955, pp. 191-196.
Zafran, E.M.  The Rococo Age:  French Masterpieces of the Eighteenth Century. Exh. Cat. High Museum of Art, Atlanta, 1988, p. 92.

Click to continue the tour to the Asian Gallery to see the Standing Gupta Buddha.

STANDING BUDDHA
Researched by Rochelle Almeida

1979.6
Artist: Unknown
Pink Sandstone Sculpture
Indian (Mathura, Uttar Pradesh)
Gupta Period, 5th century.

Who is depicted in this sculpture?
This sculpture depicts Prince Siddhartha Gautama, better known to the world as The Buddha which in Sanskrit, the ancient classical language of the Indian sub-continent, means The Enlightened One.

Who was the Buddha?
The Buddha was born Prince Siddhartha in an ancient royal family, now a part of the territory of the kingdom of Nepal.  He lived from 563 to 483 BC, i.e. for 80 years.

What do we know about the background of The Buddha?
We know that his mother Maya became miraculously pregnant in the Garden of Lumbini in present-day Nepal. He was also born miraculously because he emerged out of her side instead of like normal babies. He was a prince and enjoyed a royal privileged lifestyle. He was married and had a child. Being sheltered since the time of his birth, he had no notion of human suffering or want and, as an adult, he was exposed for the first time to a sick man, an old man and a dead man. This exposure made him aware of the existence of sickness, age and ultimately death. This realization prompted him to leave the palace and attempt to find an end to such suffering. He became an ascetic himself, leaving the palace quietly in the dead of night.

For the next six years, he tried to find an end to human anguish. He ate only 6 grains of rice a day and became completely emaciated. It was then that he realized that neither wealth nor poverty was the way to Enlightenment, but the Middle Way. Finally, he sat under the Bodhi (Fig) tree to meditate. Then, Mara, the God of Death grew nervous because Siddhartha was getting too close to escaping Death and so Mara sent out three temptations to lure the Buddha away—Ignorance, Lust or Passion and Fear. But Siddhartha remained immune. He reached his hands downwards to touch the earth to signify that he had attained Nirvana or had reached Enlightenment. He was 35 years old when he reached Enlightenment and preached his first sermon in Deer Park. He lived for 45 years more, performing miracles and preaching his new message of brotherhood of all men and ahimsa or non-violence towards all living beings.

 He is said to have eaten either tainted pork or mushrooms, contracted food poisoning and died. His remains were cremated and were placed in stupas (Buddhist temples) all over. The statue of the Reclining Buddha that is seen in many stupas all over the world is a representation of the Buddha on his deathbed.

Of what material is this statue made?
This statue is made of mottled pink (sometimes referred to as red) sandstone which is plentifully quarried all over the northern Indian sub-continent. It was carefully hand sculpted.

When was this statue sculpted?
This was probably made in the 5th century A.D. when the spread of Buddhism all over the Indian sub-continent was substantial and when pink sandstone panels depicting the life of the Buddha and statues attesting to his divinity were made to spread the faith. This red or pink sandstone sculpture had a great impact both historically and artistically, marking the first figural representation of the Buddha.

Why was such sculpture made?
It was apparently developed as a means of preserving Buddhism, then the foremost religion in Central Asia, from the onslaught of two religions—Hinduism and the then new faith, Christianity. The story of the Buddha in stone sculpture made Buddhism more romantic and more accessible to people who were faced with the representational gods of Hinduism—Brahma, Shiva and Vishnu and the compelling figures of Jesus on the Cross and the Virgin Mary which, in art form, could grip their imagination.

What is Gupta Art?
The Gupta Period  (early fourth to early sixth century), often referred to as India’s Golden Age, left the indelible print of India’s culture on the civilization of its neighbors and established an apogee against which later Indian dynasties measured their accomplishments. Cultural achievements reached unsurpassed heights, literature and the arts and sciences flourished under lavish imperial patronage. Reflecting the new rationalism and humanism that permeated all aspects of Gupta culture, art forms and style developed that provided the prototypes for areas quite distant from the subcontinent.

In sculpture, the period fostered a new naturalism as well as a harmonious ordering of a new vocabulary of forms. The highly refined system of aesthetics produced softer, gentler curves, fluid transitions from volume to volume and a sustained and complete harmony of smoothly flowing forms.  Disciplined by a strict geometric rationalization in the fifth century, this system evolved into one of humanity’s greatest art styles—the classic Gupta style.

What are some of the significant aspects of this statue?
This statue exudes monumentality. This is a representation of the Shakyamuni Buddha, i.e. the Sage of the Shakya clan because Siddhartha was a member of the Shakya clan. Images of the Buddha were not created until 500 years after the Shakya dynasty and so nobody really knows exactly what the Buddha looked like.

Why then is the Buddha usually depicted in a very stylized way all over the world?
The Buddha was said to have been born with 32 major and 80 minor signs to show that he was a Universal Being. Some were a result of his royal birth, others were acquired through his lifetime. For example, there is the bump at the top of his head (Ush Nisha) that shows his expanded wisdom—his Enlightenment, which made him smarter than anyone else.  Again, when he chopped off his hair, it automatically formed snail-like curls around his head. Hence, the Buddha is also depicted with this typical coiffeur. Also, he has a round dot on his forehead which also signifies his omniscient wisdom. His elongated ear-lobes are a result of the fact that, according to legend, when he gave up his royal lifestyle to become an ascetic, he removed his heavy gold ear-rings which left his ear-lobes extended. Furthermore, the Buddha is usually depicted with webbed finger and toes (neither or which are visible on this statue as it has suffered considerable damage). These signify the fact that he scooped people up before they fell as a result of their bad deeds. Images of the Buddha were shipped all over the eastern world to spread the faith and the webbed fingers and toes tended to travel better (they remained intact) than those statues that had individual fingers and toes.

What other aspects of this statue should we note particularly?
Every features of this statue is indicative of the Buddha’s divinity. The anthropomorphic representations of the Buddha developed during the reign of King Kanishka, the most famous of the Kushans at the end of the first century A.D. or the beginning of the second century and was destined to sweep the entire Eastern world.

The Buddha’s serene face is composed of full-rounded volumes (what is sometimes referred to as the Mathura pudginess) and smoothly interlocked shapes that from a skillfully balanced totality. Its fulsome appearance, with rounded cheeks, fleshy lips, almond-shaped eyes and high, gracefully arched eyebrows, is heightened by the potent curve of the loop of the upper hem of the garment below the neck.

He has eyebrows that are shaped like archers’ bows. His eyeballs are sculpted in the shape of lotuses or water-lilies, the national flower of India. His nose is shaped like a parrot’s beak. His lips are like ripe fruit, his chin is in the form of a mango.  The three lines around his neck imitate the shape of a conch shell, used in a lot of Indian sacred rituals.  His upper torso is made to look like the head of a cow, an animal sacred to Hinduism.

What about his clothes and accessories?
The Buddha, like all monks, is depicted as wearing two robes—an undergarment tied with strings which is sculpted so elegantly that the artist has made stone appear to have transparency, and an over garment.

The Buddha had a huge halo around his head (to signify his holiness) of which only a tiny part remains. Right behind his ears are sculpted the petals of a lotus, a flower that
blooms beautifully in the muck—signifying the fact that even out of the muck can emerge beauty. Thus, from out of the muck of life, one can still get a Buddha.

The Buddha is also presented bare footed  because he traveled everywhere on foot after he left his father’s palace, never once riding a horse again.  Hence, even today, all over the world, Buddhist monks travel from place to place on foot.

What do his hand gestures signify?
Both wrists on this statue had been destroyed, but the right hand was sculpted to be held upwards in the gesture signifying Abhaya Mudra which means Fear Not. The left hand would have reached downwards, signifying the gesture of gift-giving. Thus, this figure of the Buddha reassures and rewards the believer.

What else can we state about the iconography of the Buddha statues?
The iconography of the Buddha as a Graeco-Roman figure started in the ancient city of Taxila in present-day Pakistan and spread to Mathura, the southern capital of the Kushans, where it became more Indianized. As the pilgrims took this new figural art eastward from Mathura, the images changed.  No longer Graeco-Roman, no longer Indian, these sculptures adopted both the dress and physiognomy of Burma, China, Southeast Asia and eventually Japan. Thus, the revolutionary Graeco-Buddhist sculpture of Gandhara became the accepted art form of the entire Buddhist world.

Some historians believe that Gandharan art (of which this statue is a fine example) came about through the descendants of Greek artisans and sculptors brought to the Greek satrapies or colonial territories by Alexander the Great around 327-326 BC. These made their way into Gandhara where they carved the figures, especially in the area of Taxila where the art was basically Graeco-Roman.

Conclusion:
This then is the great contribution of Gandharan art under the Kushans; the development of the Buddha image, an art form that must be considered one of the important in the history of Asia.

Bibliography:
Orzac, Bebe Fleiss and Edward S:  “Gandharan Art of Central Asia”. Arts of Asia. January-February 1983, 78-88.

Selig, Catherine: “Art of South and South East Asia”. From class notes taken during lecture delivered to Highlights Trainees in the Galleries on February 26, 2001.

Continue the tour of the Asian Galleries to enter The Ming Scholar’s Garden of the Astor Court