BENTONVILLE — The Crystal Bridges staff won’t offer a tentative opening date for the museum, but that hasn’t kept its growing collection of American masterworks from making their way across the globe.
Visitors to the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York City have been able to study “Kindred Spirits” by Asher B. Durand. “Professor Benjamin Howard Rand” by Thomas Eakins is on loan to the Philadelphia Museum of Art, while recently announced acquisition “War News from Mexico” by Richard Caton Woodville is on view at the Los Angeles County Museum of Art.
Crystal Bridges also has a pair of masterworks on display at the Seattle Art Museum and nine on loan to the Amon Carter Museum in Fort Worth, Texas. Twenty pieces of art from Crystal Bridges’ permanent collection are on loan across the United States and, in recent years, others have traveled as far as China.
“We’ve had people come up to us and say, ‘Hey, I saw Kindred Spirits when I was in New York’ or others who have been in Seattle and seen some work from Crystal Bridges’ collection,” said Chris Crosman, the museum’s chief curator. “We look at this as an opportunity to share these works with other institutions and really put these works in front of different audiences across the country before we open our doors in Bentonville. Some of these works have been out of public view for some time.”
Loaning artwork is also a way to start building relationships between museums and other institutions that figure to benefit all parties involved.
“This is an act of extreme generosity on Crystal Bridges’ part, to share its collection like this,” said Rebecca Lawton, curator of paintings and sculptures at the Amon Carter Museum. “It’s so nice to begin this exchange now. It’s something to kind of get the juices going between the two museums, and I see that relationship continuing and getting even stronger as we move forward.”
Andrew Walker, assistant director of curatorial affairs at the St. Louis Art Museum echoed Lawton’s feelings.
“We truly value relationships like these, where there’s that opportunity to share and partner and really enhance the guest experience,” Walker said. “What makes ‘Still Life with Flowers’ even so special is the period this image comes from was perhaps one of the peaks of (Stuart) Davis’ career. ... We’re so pleased Crystal Bridges has allowed us to show it here.”
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