GREAT MUSEUMS: Solomon R.Guggenheim Museum New York
In 1939 The Museum of Non-Objective Painting opened its rented quarters at 24 East 54th Street, showcasing the collection of American and European abstract and nonobjective artworks that Solomon R. Guggenheim had begun assembling a decade before. Since that time, the collection of the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum has grown exponentially, expanding in both historical and stylistic range and depth.
By Efi Michalarou
Photo: Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum Archive
The special collections listed below represent several of the major historical additions to the collection, but by no means encompass the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum’s complete holdings. Solomon R. Guggenheim Founding Collection: The Museum holds approximately 600 artworks that were given to the museum by Solomon Guggenheim between 1937 and 1949, or purchased by the foundation during those years. Karl Nierendorf Estate: In 1948 the Guggenheim Foundation purchased the entire estate of New York art dealer Karl Nierendorf. The acquisition of the estate of Karl Nierendorf expanded the Guggenheim collection through the addition of important German and Austrian Expressionist works, it also ushered in a concentration of over 50 paintings and works on paper by Paul Klee. Katherine S. Dreier Bequest Collection: In 1953 the Foundation received a small but important bequest by one of 20th Century art’s most influential figures, Katherine S. Dreier Bequest, who, along with Marcel Duchamp and Man Ray, had founded the Société Anonyme. Thannhauser Collection: the Museum’s holdings were dramatically enriched when the foundation received a portion of Justin K. Thannhauser’s prized collection of Impressionist, Post-Impressionist, and Modern French masterpieces as a permanent loan and promised gift. These paintings and sculptures formally entered the collection in 1978, two years after Thannhauser’s death, and were augmented by additional gifts from his widow, Hilde, between 1981 and 1991. Panza Collection: Between 1990 and 1992, the Guggenheim acquired, through purchase and gift, over 350 works of Minimalist, Post-Minimalist, and Conceptual Art from the Collection of Giuseppe Panza di Biumo. Widely acknowledged as one of the most important single concentrations of American Art of the ‘60s and ‘70s, the Panza Collection gave the Guggenheim depth and quality in in postwar art commensurate with the strength of its prewar holdings. In 2010, the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum launched the Panza Collection Initiative, a grant-funded project to address the long-term preservation and future exhibition of artworks in this collection. The Robert Mapplethorpe Foundation Gift: In 1992, the Robert Mapplethorpe Foundation named the Guggenheim Foundation the recipient of approximately 200 of Mapplethorpe’s photographs and unique objects. The gift was realized in several stages between 1993 and 1998. Bohen Foundation Gift: In 2001, the Bohen Foundation, a private charitable organization that commissions new works of art with an emphasis on film, video, and new media, gave the Guggenheim its holdings of some 275 works by 45 artists, immeasurably expanding the museum’s Collection of Contemporary Art.
