Bid to win the chance for you and 5 lucky friends to be given a private behind-the-scenes tour of the The Metropolitan Museum of Art led by Daniel Kershaw, Exhibition Design Manager!
A private tour for up to six people, with insights into the behind the scenes process of exhibitions and installations. Tour can be adapted to the interest of the group, as well as focused on new exhibitions and projects. Lunch or dinner at the Members and Patrons Restaurant can be arranged by separate reservations.
Below are a few of the exhibits available now:
Félix Vallotton: Painter of Disquiet presents pivotal moments in the artist's career as a painter and printmaker. Painted portraits, luminous landscapes, and interior narratives that pulse with psychological tension join the exhibition from more than two dozen lenders. Swiss-born and Paris-educated, Vallotton (1865–1925) created lasting imagery of fin-de-siècle Paris. Witness to the radical aesthetics that gripped Paris in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, Vallotton developed his own singular voice. Today we recognize him as a distinctive artist of his generation. His lampooning wit, subversive satire, and wry humor is apparent everywhere in his artistic production. Vallotton's trenchant woodcuts of the 1890s solidified his reputation as a printmaker of the first rank while boldly messaging his left-wing politics. For the first time ever, this exhibition displays Picasso's legendary portrait of Gertrude Stein, from The Met collection, alongside Vallotton's rendering of this formidable collector, which was painted a year later. Vallotton finished his portrait in a matter of weeks and gave it to Gertrude Stein.
Art of Native America This landmark exhibition in the Museum's American Wing showcases 116 masterworks representing the achievements of artists from more than fifty cultures across North America. Ranging in date from the second to the early twentieth century, the diverse works are promised gifts, donations, and loans to The Met from the pioneering collectors Charles and Valerie Diker. Long considered to be the most significant holdings of historical Native American art in private hands, the Diker Collection has particular strengths in sculpture from British Columbia and Alaska, California baskets, pottery from southwestern pueblos, Plains drawings and regalia, and rare accessories from the eastern Woodlands.
Kyoto: Capital of Artistic Imagination Focusing on the main turning points in the cultural history of Kyoto from ancient to modern times, Kyoto: Capital of Artistic Imagination places special emphasis on the decorative arts. Over eighty masterworks of lacquers, ceramics, metalwork, and textiles from The Met collection, including a number of recently acquired works of contemporary art are showcased. A selection of over fifty paintings by masters of various schools are accompanied by a rare fourteenth-century suit of armor, splendid export lacquers made for the European market in the late sixteenth-century, exquisite eighteenth-century Noh robes, as well as austere tea wares with characteristic imperfections. Heian-kyō, as modern-day Kyoto was once referred to, became the seat of the imperial court in 794 and remained the capital of Japan until 1869, when the court was transferred to Tokyo. The rich cultural heritage of this city was profoundly shaped by the presence of the emperor and aristocrats as well as high-ranking warriors, varied groups of artists, and literati working in the orbit of the palace. Buddhist temples, Shinto shrines, Noh theaters, workshops of painters and lacquer artists, ceramic kilns, textile shops, a flourishing tea culture, and bustling market districts, as well as supremely elegant architecture and gardens contributed to the advancement of the vibrant cultural life of Kyoto.