The Harvard Art Museums—comprising the Fogg Museum, the Busch-Reisinger Museum and the Arthur M. Sackler Museum—today announced that the renovation and expansion of the landmark building at 32 Quincy Street in Cambridge, Massachusetts, will open in the fall of 2014. Designed by architect Renzo Piano, the transformative facility will bring the three museums and their collections together under one roof for the first time. The expansion will create new spaces and resources to advance the Harvard Art Museums’ mission of teaching across many disciplines, conducting research, training museum professionals, and presenting exhibitions and programs for the Harvard University community and the public.
The building that currently houses the Arthur M. Sackler Museum at 485 Broadway has remained open since the renovation and expansion project began in 2008, providing ongoing access to the collections of all three museums. The current Sackler galleries will close at the end of regular hours on June 1, 2013, in order for the Harvard Art Museums to conduct the final phases of the project, including packing and moving collections and preparing to install the galleries in the new facility. The building at 485 Broadway will remain open for staff, faculty, students, and events. The special exhibition In Harmony: The Norma Jean Calderwood Collection of Islamic Art will be on view at that site through June 1, 2013.
The new facility will provide opportunities for the Fogg, Busch-Reisinger, and Arthur M. Sackler museums to exhibit their collections in new ways—with dialogue and juxtapositions between objects from different cultures, time periods, and media—and will provide a flexible and innovative model for multidisciplinary study and learning. The expansion will strengthen the Harvard Art Museums’ role at the forefront of visual arts research and scholarship, while providing broader public access and a dynamic cultural space for the Cambridge and Greater Boston communities. www.harvardartmuseums.org