Herbert F. Johnson Museum of Art

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The Herbert F. Johnson Museum of Art is located near the Cornell University Arts quad in Ithaca, New York. It is most well known for its controversial concrete facade, its collection which includes two windows from Frank Lloyd Wright's Darwin D. Martin House and more than 30,000 other works.

Its fifth floor observation level houses the museum's extensive Asian collection. Prior to the 1973 opening of this museum, Cornell's art collection was housed in the Andrew D. White House.

The building is named in honor of Herbert Fisk Johnson '22 who headed the S.C. Johnson & Sons of Racine, Wisconsin ("Johnson Wax"), funded the construction of the museum, and served as a Cornell Trustee.

[edit] Architecture

The Johnson Museum of Art was designed by architect I.M. Pei in 1973. It can be characterized by its top two floors, which cantilever over the open aired sculpture garden. It was designed so that it would not block the view of Cayuga Lake, and offers a panoramic view of the same from its fifth floor. It also houses a room for meetings.

An essay that Pei's firm wrote about the building can be found here. It explains some of the challenges raised by the building's location: the top of Libe Slope and at the very end of the "Stone Row" formed by McGraw, Morrill, and White Halls.

One element of the original design, which was never constructed, was an underground Asian art gallery which would have included windows breaching the Southern face of Fall Creek Gorge.

[edit] Collections

The permanent collection consists of more than 30,000 works of art. Most notable is the George and Mary Rockwell Asian Art collection. There are also extensive holdings of American artist, including Stuart Davis and Robert Rauschenberg, as well as members of the Hudson River School and the American Impressionists to contemporary art. The Collection of Prints, Drawings, and Photographs consists of more than 15,000 works.

[edit] External links

• Herbert F. Johnson Museum of Art, official Cornell University website.
• Cornell University Image Collections (with photos from museum).
• Herbert F. Johnson Museum of Art, Artcom.com.
• "Herbert F. Johnson Museum of Art", Life in Ithaca blog (April 8, 2005).

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