#metropolitan museum of art

[ilumies]

alexander mcqueen: savage beauty

[homerstroystory]

Looks vs. Loot at the Metropolitan Museum of Art by The Antiquities Coalition (@/CombatLooting) on Twitter

Transcription below the cut

1: The #MetGala may be "fashion's biggest night," but tonight's event hides some dark truths at @/metmuseum...including a long history of looted antiquities. To spotlight some of the contested objects from the Met's collection, we are featuring #MetGala vs. Loot [THREAD]

2. First up: @/KimKardashian in @/Versace at the 2018 #MetGala posing next to the Golden Sarcophagus of Nedjemankh. The coffin was purchased by @/metmuseum in 2017 and repatriated in 2019 after this viral photo helped solve the case. (link)

3. Next, her sister @/KendallJenner in @/givenchy at the 2021 #MetGala as the 13th century wooden Temple Strut with Salabhinka, returned from @/metmuseum to the Government of Nepal in 2022, after it was determined to be looked from Itum Baha in Kathmandu. (link)

4. Another object from Nepal, @/rihanna in @/Margiel at the 2018 #MetGala as a 10th century Shiva in Himalayan Adobe with Ascetics. @/metmuseum was gifted the sculpture in 1995, but repatriated it to Nepal in 2022 along with the temple strut, after learning both were stolen.

5. Dakota Johnson in @/gucci at the 2022 #MetGala as a terracotta kylix (c. 470 bCE). This piece, valued at $1.5 million, was seized from the @/metmuseum in July 2022 after being linked to Italian antiquities trafficker Gianfranco Becchina. (link)

6. @/billieeilish in @/gucci at the 2022 #MetGala as the Fayum Mummy Portrait. Looted from Egypt and sold to @/metmuseum in 2013, it was seized in September '22 by @/ManhattanDA as part of a global investigation into an international trafficking ring. (link)

7. @/iamcardib in @/ThomeBrowne at the 2019 #MetGala as a painted linen fragment displaying a scene from the Book of Exodus, 'Exodus Painting" (250-450 CE), valued at over $1.6 million. The fragments were also part of the seizure by the @/ManhattanDA in September '22.

8. @/Beyonce in @/givenchy at the 2013 #MetGala as a 2,300-year-old vase that depicts the god Dionysus. The vase is linked to Giacomo Medici, an art dealer convicted of conspiracy to traffic antiquities in 2004, and was seized from the @/metmuseum in 2017. (link)

9. @/blakelively in @/Versace at the 2022 #MetGala as a bronze statuette of Jupiter. This object is among 27 antiquities that were returned to Italy and Egypt in 2022 after investigators seized them from the @/metmuseum. (link)

[lionofchaeronea]

The Parable of the Wise and Foolish Virgins, William Blake, ca. 1799-1800

[didoofcarthage]

Julius Caesar by Andrea di Pietro di Marco Ferrucci 

Italian (from Florence), c. 1512-1514

marble

Metropolitan Museum of Art

[semioticapocalypse]

Elliott Erwitt. Archer. The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York. 1949

I Am Collective Memories   •    Follow me, — says Visual Ratatosk

[johnnydombrowski]

[fox-teeth]

Went to The Met's Egyptian wing to draw jackals, for my agonies.

9B pure graphite pencil on sketchbook.

[thearchaicsmile]

Terracotta red figure lekythos from Attica depicting the goddess Athena carrying a spear and helmet and adorned with the aegis in the form of a Gorgon head, along with her signature glaux, 'little owl' hovering to her right. Attributed to the Brygos Painter, 490 - 480 BC.

🏛️: Metropolitan Museum of Art

[magnetictapedatastorage]

object 30.8.346, figure raising legs to expose genitals. recently identified as Omphale, greek mythological figure with powers over the womb.

the sculpture is just half an inch tall.

[arthistoryanimalia]

From #Woodensday into #Feathersday…

Taus (mayuri), India, c.1885 wood, parchment, metal, feathers The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York

“The name of this bowed instrument means peacock, the bird associated with Saraswati, the goddess of music. Popular at 19th century courts, it derives its form from the dilruba, an instrument combining features of other Indian stringed instruments like the sarangi and the sitar.”

[princessfromthelandofporcelain]

Chūkei fan with the Queen Mother of the West and King Mu of Zhou (obverse) and a plum tree and young pines (reverse)

Japanese, Edo Period, first half of the 19th century

ink, color, gold, and gold leaf on paper; bamboo ribs and lacquer

Metropolitan Museum of Art

[ilumies]

alexander mcqueen “savage beauty” exhibition at the metropolitan museum of art, 2011

[homerstroystory]

Palette depicting a pair of mud turtles, Predynastic Egypt/Early Naqada II (c. 3650-3500 BCE), stone (greywacke)

currently in the collection of the Metropolitan Museum of Art (New York City), accession no. 10.176.78

[lionofchaeronea]

Crow and Willow Tree, Kawanabe Kyosai, 1887

[didoofcarthage]

Three Peonies and Two Roses by Anne Vallayer-Coster

French, c. 1810

pen and gray ink, with brush and gray wash, over black chalk

Metropolitan Museum of Art

[pagansphinx]

The Story of Madame X

John Singer Sargent (American, 1856–1925) • Madame X (Virginie Amélie Avegno Gautreau) • 1883-84 • Metropolitan Museum of Art

Photograph of Sargent with what is perhaps his most famous portrait – that of the very wealthy socialite, Madame Gautreau. This is not the original version, though; the one that shocked the art world in 1884 when it was shown at the Paris Salon.

Above is a sketch for the Gautreau portrait. At some point Sargent decided to paint the right strap of her dress seductively off her shoulder. When the portrait was shown in Paris, there was an uproar of disapproval. Madame Gautreau was, apparently, already rumored to be an adultress. Her Singer portrait only added emphasis to the public's criticism of her character. According to the gallery card at the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston (the painting was on loan from the MET), Gautreau very much liked the painting. What neither she nor Sargent predicted was that it would cause such a stir and be the cause of much conversation, mostly derisive, in the drawing rooms of Paris high society.

Sargent was so upset by the reaction at the Salon and the ensuing buzz that he took the painting back to his studio and repainted the strap in its proper place on the shoulder.

The painting was eventually sold on the condition that its subject not be revealed in the title. It was to be called Madame X.

Sources:

Museum of Fine Arts, Boston

Metropolitan Museum of Art

Arty: Why Madame X Scandalized the Art World by Alina Cohen