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| Established | 1903 |
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| Location | Pittsfield, Berkshire County, Massachusetts, United States |
| Coordinates | 42°26′50″N73°15′13″W / 42.44722°N 73.25361°W |
| Type | |
| Collections | Natural history, art, ancient Egyptian mummy, Babylonian art |
| Website | www |
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The Berkshire Museum is a museum of art, natural history, and ancient civilization that is located in Pittsfield in Berkshire County, Massachusetts.
In 1903, local paper magnate Zenas Crane founded the Berkshire Museum. [1] [2] Inspired by such institutions as the American Museum of Natural History, the Smithsonian, and the Metropolitan Museum of Art, Crane decided to blend the best attributes of these establishments in a new museum for the people of Western Massachusetts. Thanks in large part to Crane's efforts, the broad and varied collections of Berkshire Museum include over 40,000 objects from virtually every continent—from important fine art and sculpture to natural science specimens and ancient artifacts.
As the third-generation owner of Crane & Company, a paper manufacturer that was (and continues to be) the official supplier of paper to the U.S. Treasury, Crane invested his wealth in his community. He actively sought out art and artifacts for Berkshire Museum, and encouraged the development of collections that would bring home to the Berkshires a wide cross-section of the world's wonders. Berkshire Museum became a "window on the world." The building was designed by the local architect Henry Seaver. [3] [4]
Crane purchased many of Berkshire Museum's first acquisitions, including a sizable group of paintings from the revered Hudson River School. Significant works by Albert Bierstadt and Frederic Edwin Church were a part of this early collection.
The museum's first curator was Harlan H. Ballard, who stayed in that role until early 1931. He was replaced by Laura M. Bragg who became director of the museum. [5]
The diverse collections also boast artifacts of ancient history and natural science: fossil collections, a 143-pound meteorite, an Egyptian mummy, shards of Babylonian cuneiform tablets, samplings of early Mediterranean jewelry, and representations of Berkshire ecosystems including local mammals, birds, reptiles, fish, insects, plants, and minerals.
Berkshire Museum is the repository for objects associated with the lives of well-known figures in American history. The first successful expedition to the North Pole by Robert E. Peary and Matthew Henson in 1908 and 1909 was supported by Crane. Henson's whole-body fur suit, the sledge that made the trip, and other equipment from the trek found a home at Berkshire Museum. The writing desk of Nathaniel Hawthorne and the musket believed to have belonged to Israel Bissell (a cohort of Paul Revere who made a midnight ride to Philadelphia to warn, "The British are coming!") also are part of the extensive permanent collection.
Berkshire Museum has exhibited works by some of the most accomplished artists from the United States and abroad: Gilbert Stuart, Rembrandt Peale, John Singleton Copley, Thomas Sully, Paul Cézanne, Pierre Auguste Renoir, and John Singer Sargent. In the 1930s, the Berkshire Museum was the first museum to commission two site-specific mobiles (then a unique form of art) from Alexander Calder, who became one of the most significant artists of the 20th century. In the 1950s, the Berkshire Museum was the first to display the work of Norman Rockwell, as well as pieces by artists that challenged convention, such as Andy Warhol, Red Grooms, Robert Rauschenberg, Ellsworth Kelly, and Nancy Graves.
Berkshire Museum continues to add to the collections through purchases and gifts. In the 21st-century, acquisitions have focused on artists with national and international reputations who have strong connections to the Berkshires: Gregory Crewdson, Peter Garfield, Morgan Bulkeley, Stephen Hannock, Tom Patti, and others. [6]
The Feigenbaum Hall of Innovation opened in March 2008. This new hall falls in line with the museum's traditional "curiosity cabinet" appeal and is dedicated to local innovators. [7]
In October 2014, Berkshire Museum's "Dino Dig" paleontology exhibition was replaced by Spark!Lab, a hands-on, inventors laboratory space developed by the Jerome and Dorothy Lemelson Center for the Study of Invention and Innovation at the National Museum of American History.
In order to remain solvent, in July 2017, the Board of Directors at the Berkshire Museum announced a plan to sell the most significant portion of their art collection including two Norman Rockwell paintings, Blacksmith's Boy – Heel and Toe (Shaftsbury Blacksmith Shop) (1940) and Shuffleton's Barbershop (1950), which were given to the museum by Norman Rockwell himself. They contracted with Sotheby's to auction a total of 40 pieces from their collection. The art was removed from the museum before the sale was announced, and museum officials initially refused to name the works that were to be sold. [8] The estimated proceeds from the sale would be $50 million.
The art sale created controversy not only among the residents of Berkshire County, but within the larger art world, though many museums stood behind the Berkshire Museum's decision. [9] [10] [11] [12] The Massachusetts Attorney General's brief of October 30, 2017, supported opposition to the sale and joined the plaintiffs in court. [13] On November 1, 2017, before a packed courthouse, Superior Court Judge John A. Agostini heard arguments on both sides of the controversy centered on the right of the plaintiffs to sue. That same day, the Attorney General finally agreed that the Museum was in “serious financial trouble.” [14] Judge Agostini's ruling was published on November 7, denying the plaintiffs' motion for a preliminary injunction and dismissing the non-governmental plaintiffs for lack of standing. [15] Judge Agostini, when ruling that the sale could proceed, wrote that the Attorney General’s four-month investigation “has uncovered no evidence of bad faith, no conflict of interest, no breach of loyalty, no express gift restrictions, and yielded unconvincing evidence of implied gift restrictions or a breach of reasonable care during a two-year decision-making process.” [14] The Superior Court deemed it “beyond objection” that the Museum’s “financial outlook is bleak.” [14]
Nevertheless, the Massachusetts Appeals Court granted a temporary injunction to halt the sale that expired on December 11. The sale was opposed by the descendants of Norman Rockwell, who donated work to the museum with the belief that it would always remain at the museum. Museum organizations condemned the plan to sell the items, with the state's lawyers asserting that the museum intended to sell nearly all of its valuable art to subsidize operating and other expenses. [16] [17] [18] [12] After months of negotiating at the Appellate Court level, a tentative settlement was reached on February 9, 2018, between the plaintiffs and the Attorney General's office. As of March 20, that settlement was in the hands of Justice David A. Lowy of the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court, following a hearing involving lawyers from the Massachusetts Attorney General's office, the museum, and two separate groups of plaintiffs opposing the settlement. [19] [20]
On April 11, 2018, it was announced that the Berkshire Museum had sold Shuffleton's Barbershop by Rockwell to the Lucas Museum of Narrative Art for an undisclosed amount. [21] [22] The painting was to be loaned to the Norman Rockwell Museum in nearby Stockbridge for display into 2020. [22] Other works, including Blacksmith's Boy – Heel and Toe, were scheduled for sale at a Sotheby's auction in May 2018. [22] Shortly after these initial sales, museum director Van Shields retired. [23] In late November 2018, the museum announced that it had completed its sale of artworks, having raised $53.25 million through the sale of 22 pieces. [24] Most of the money was used to create an endowment fund to help ensure the future survival of the museum. [25]
Norman Percevel Rockwell was an American painter and illustrator. His works have a broad popular appeal in the United States for their reflection of the country's culture. Rockwell is most famous for the cover illustrations of everyday life he created for The Saturday Evening Post magazine over nearly five decades. Among the best-known of Rockwell's works are the Willie Gillis series, Rosie the Riveter, the Four Freedoms series, Saying Grace, and The Problem We All Live With. He is also noted for his 64-year relationship with the Boy Scouts of America (BSA), during which he produced covers for their publication Boys' Life, calendars, and other illustrations. These works include popular images that reflect the Scout Oath and Scout Law such as The Scoutmaster, A Scout Is Reverent, and A Guiding Hand.
Berkshire County is the westernmost county in the U.S. state of Massachusetts. As of the 2020 census, the population was 129,026. Its largest city and traditional county seat is Pittsfield. The county was founded in 1761. The Berkshire Hills are centered on Berkshire County. Residents are known as Berkshirites. It exists today only as a historical geographic region, and has no county government, with the exception of the retirement board for former county workers, and the offices of the sheriff and the registrar of deeds.
Pittsfield is the largest city and the county seat of Berkshire County, Massachusetts, United States. It is the principal city of the Pittsfield, Massachusetts Metropolitan Statistical Area which encompasses all of Berkshire County. Pittsfield’s population was 43,927 at the 2020 census. Although its population has declined in recent decades, Pittsfield remains the third-largest municipality in Western Massachusetts, behind only Springfield and Chicopee.
Stockbridge is a town in Berkshire County in Western Massachusetts, United States. It is part of the Pittsfield, Massachusetts, Metropolitan Statistical Area. The population was 2,018 at the 2020 census. A year-round resort area, Stockbridge is home to the Norman Rockwell Museum, Naumkeag, a public garden and historic house, the Austen Riggs Center, and Chesterwood, home and studio of sculptor Daniel Chester French.
The Berkshires are highlands located in western Massachusetts and northwestern Connecticut in the United States. Generally, "Berkshires" may refer to the range of hills in Massachusetts that lie between the Housatonic and Connecticut Rivers. Highlands of northwest Connecticut may be seen as part of the Berkshires and sometimes called the Northwest Hills or Litchfield Hills. The segment of the Taconic Mountains in Massachusetts is often considered a part of the Berkshires, although they are geologically separate and are a comparatively narrow range along New York's eastern border.
The Ashuwillticook Rail Trail is a 14.05-mile (22.61 km) rail trail that runs north-south through the towns of Cheshire, Lanesborough and Adams, and into the city of Pittsfield, Massachusetts. It is a multi-use trail for biking, walking, roller-blading, and jogging. The trail is managed by the Massachusetts Department of Conservation and Recreation (DCR). It was built on the former Pittsfield and North Adams Railroad.
The Norman Rockwell Museum is an art museum in Stockbridge, Massachusetts, United States, dedicated to the art of Norman Rockwell. It is home to the world's largest collection of original Rockwell art. The museum also hosts traveling exhibitions pertaining to American illustration.
The Bennington Banner is a daily newspaper published in Bennington, Vermont. The paper covers local, national, and world news. It is distributed throughout Southwestern Vermont and eastern New York. The paper is owned by Vermont News and Media LLC and is published Monday through Friday, plus a weekend edition.
Clemens Kalischer was an American photojournalist and art photographer. He was born in Germany and immigrated to the United States.
The Berkshire Eagle is an American daily newspaper published in Pittsfield, Massachusetts, and covering all of Berkshire County, as well as four New York communities near Pittsfield. It is considered a newspaper of record for Berkshire County, Massachusetts.
WBEC is a commercial AM radio station broadcasting a talk and sports radio format. It is licensed to Pittsfield, Massachusetts, and is owned by Townsquare Media.
WUPE-FM is a classic hits radio station owned by Townsquare Media. Licensed to North Adams, Massachusetts, United States, WUPE-FM serves Pittsfield.
Francis H. Mahoney was an American professional basketball player. He had a brief stint in the National Basketball Association (NBA) during the 1950s.
Christopher Nicholas Speranzo is an American lawyer and politician from Massachusetts.
Pittsfield High School is a four year comprehensive public high school in Pittsfield, Massachusetts, United States. It serves the city of Pittsfield. The school dates its founding to 1844. It is administered by the Pittsfield Public Schools district and is the oldest of the district's two high schools. Enrollment for the 2014-2015 school year included 916 students. 51% of the student population was female and 49% were male. Students of African American, Asian, Hispanic, Native American, Native Hawaiian, Pacific Islander and Multi-Race, Non-Hispanic ethnicity and heritage comprised 21.8% percent of the student population.
Amy Bess Williams Miller was an American historian, preservationist, trustee, and civic leader from the cities of Worcester and Pittsfield, Massachusetts. Best known for leading the effort to preserve Hancock Shaker Village on the border of Pittsfield and Hancock, Massachusetts and establish a museum there, she was a major scholar of Shaker history, society, and artifacts. In addition to serving as the Hancock museum's first president, she was president of the Berkshire Athenaeum, member of the Massachusetts Board of Library Commissioners and American Antiquarian Society, and trustee of Berkshire Medical Center, the Berkshire Museum, Miss Hall's School, the Massachusetts Audubon Society, and the Shaker Museum and Library. Miller's published works all deal with Shaker history and society. She wrote four books and co-edited a fifth, contributed an article to The Herbarist, and contributed to numerous exhibits.
The Rookie or The Rookie is a 1957 painting by American artist Norman Rockwell, painted for the March 2, 1957, cover of The Saturday Evening Post magazine.
The Berkshire Flyer is a seasonal Amtrak passenger train service between New York City and the Berkshire Mountains in Pittsfield, Massachusetts, via the Hudson Valley. The weekly train departs Penn Station on Friday and Sunday afternoons during the summer and returns on Sundays. The route's 2023 season began on May 26 and ran through October 9 as the second year of a three-year pilot program.
Russell Lord is an American writer and curator working in the field of photography and the history of art. He is currently the Chief of Curatorial Affairs at the Norman Rockwell Museum. He previously served as the Director of Exhibitions and Curatorial Initiatives at the American Federation of Arts (2023-2024) and the Freeman Family Curator of Photographs, Prints, and Drawings at the New Orleans Museum of Art, a position he held from October 2011 to April 2023.
Marriage License is an oil painting by American illustrator Norman Rockwell created for the cover of the June 11, 1955, edition of The Saturday Evening Post. It depicts a young man and woman filling out a marriage license application at a government building in front of a bored-looking clerk. The man is dressed in a tan suit and has his arm around his partner, who is wearing a yellow dress and standing on tiptoe to sign her name. Although the room and its furnishings are dark, the couple are illuminated by the window beside them. The contrast between the couple and the clerk highlights two reoccurring themes in Rockwell's works: young love and ordinary life.
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