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Jan 24, 2009, 4:16:38 AM1/24/09
to COLLECTIBLES and MORE in STORE
The Los Angeles County Museum of Art (LACMA) presents Hearst the
Collector, an unprecedented exhibition that reunites approximately 150
of the best works of art from the media tycoon’s vast and varied
holdings. This exhibit can be enjoyed now through February 1, 2009 in
the Art of the Americas Building.
William Randolph Hearst (1863–1951), one of the most flamboyant
collectors of all time, assembled a massive and distinguished
collection that was largely dispersed and sold during a liquidity
crisis in the late 1930s.
Primarily as a result of the negative portrayal in Orson Welles’ film,
Citizen Kane—a dark reinvention of Hearst’s life—the collection never
received its due acclaim. Now, with many of the most significant
objects brought together once more, Hearst is finally revealed as an
accomplished and discriminating collector. The most important aspects
of William Randolph Hearst’s activities as a collector will be
represented in LACMA’s exhibition, including his
particularly strong collections of arms and armor, silver, and
Renaissance tapestries. In each of these areas, he surpassed virtually
all his contemporaries, amassing the greatest quantity of top-tier
works.
Hearst also formed legendary treasuries of medieval and Renaissance
goldsmiths’ work and Limoges enamels. In addition, there were
paintings by Boucher, 2 Copley, David, van Dyck, Fragonard, Gérôme,
Greuze, Lawrence, Lotto, Reynolds, and Vouet, with sculptures by
Canova, Clodion, Marin, Sansovino, and Thorvaldsen, many of which will
be on view. His classical antiquities boasted the illustrious
provenances of historic British collections such as Buckingham,
Hamilton, Hope, and Lansdowne, but his passion for California and the
American frontier, exemplified by his collection of three hundred
Native American textiles, set him apart from traditional American
collectors in New York and Boston. A number of extraordinary loans
from Hearst Castle®, including the historic marble statue, the
Lansdowne Venus by Antonio Canova, will be highlighted to show the
breathtaking range of Hearst’s interests. This is the first time that
the statue has left the Castle since Hearst installed it there in the
1930s. A complement of four full suits of armor (coming from the
Metropolitan Museum of Art and the Detroit Institute of Arts), a jewel-
like sword, and a pair of intricately inlaid Baroque guns almost fifty
inches long, will join them. From the Louvre comes one of the great
masterpieces of Renaissance goldsmiths’ work, the sumptuous mother-of-
pearl box edged in vermeil, dotted with garnets, and topped by four
spherical emeralds, that once belonged to King Francis I and dates
from 1532–33.
The exhibition marks the first time this splendid object d’art has
been shown in the United States. Other examples of goldsmiths’ work
will be displayed in an opulent treasury highlighted by a nearly 30-
inch-tall gold cup that when filled could hold almost three quarts of
wine. A full complement of drawings by Hearst’s preferred architect,
Julia Morgan—the first woman (and the first American) to earn a degree
from the École des Beaux-Arts in Paris—will also be displayed. The
exhibition will be augmented with several loans from private
collections, with more than two dozen extraordinary objects from
Hearst Castle®.
Collector, an unprecedented exhibition that reunites approximately 150
of the best works of art from the media tycoon’s vast and varied
holdings. This exhibit can be enjoyed now through February 1, 2009 in
the Art of the Americas Building.
William Randolph Hearst (1863–1951), one of the most flamboyant
collectors of all time, assembled a massive and distinguished
collection that was largely dispersed and sold during a liquidity
crisis in the late 1930s.
Primarily as a result of the negative portrayal in Orson Welles’ film,
Citizen Kane—a dark reinvention of Hearst’s life—the collection never
received its due acclaim. Now, with many of the most significant
objects brought together once more, Hearst is finally revealed as an
accomplished and discriminating collector. The most important aspects
of William Randolph Hearst’s activities as a collector will be
represented in LACMA’s exhibition, including his
particularly strong collections of arms and armor, silver, and
Renaissance tapestries. In each of these areas, he surpassed virtually
all his contemporaries, amassing the greatest quantity of top-tier
works.
Hearst also formed legendary treasuries of medieval and Renaissance
goldsmiths’ work and Limoges enamels. In addition, there were
paintings by Boucher, 2 Copley, David, van Dyck, Fragonard, Gérôme,
Greuze, Lawrence, Lotto, Reynolds, and Vouet, with sculptures by
Canova, Clodion, Marin, Sansovino, and Thorvaldsen, many of which will
be on view. His classical antiquities boasted the illustrious
provenances of historic British collections such as Buckingham,
Hamilton, Hope, and Lansdowne, but his passion for California and the
American frontier, exemplified by his collection of three hundred
Native American textiles, set him apart from traditional American
collectors in New York and Boston. A number of extraordinary loans
from Hearst Castle®, including the historic marble statue, the
Lansdowne Venus by Antonio Canova, will be highlighted to show the
breathtaking range of Hearst’s interests. This is the first time that
the statue has left the Castle since Hearst installed it there in the
1930s. A complement of four full suits of armor (coming from the
Metropolitan Museum of Art and the Detroit Institute of Arts), a jewel-
like sword, and a pair of intricately inlaid Baroque guns almost fifty
inches long, will join them. From the Louvre comes one of the great
masterpieces of Renaissance goldsmiths’ work, the sumptuous mother-of-
pearl box edged in vermeil, dotted with garnets, and topped by four
spherical emeralds, that once belonged to King Francis I and dates
from 1532–33.
The exhibition marks the first time this splendid object d’art has
been shown in the United States. Other examples of goldsmiths’ work
will be displayed in an opulent treasury highlighted by a nearly 30-
inch-tall gold cup that when filled could hold almost three quarts of
wine. A full complement of drawings by Hearst’s preferred architect,
Julia Morgan—the first woman (and the first American) to earn a degree
from the École des Beaux-Arts in Paris—will also be displayed. The
exhibition will be augmented with several loans from private
collections, with more than two dozen extraordinary objects from
Hearst Castle®.
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