The new Barnes: Worth the wait (1st review)

The Barnes Collection is safe, intact and beautifully housed in its new lodgings on the Parkway. It looks reassuringly the same but wonderfully refreshed, and the art is as amazing as ever.

I don't know exactly how they did it, but somehow they packed it up and brought it along, in company with the Renoirs, the Cézannes and the Matisses. When you cross the open atrium hall in the new Barnes Foundation building and enter the galleries that now house the Barnes Collection, you'll find that same hallowed, golden-tinged, slightly musty aura that marked the experience in the original building.

The paintings, the sculptures, the homey chests and wooden chairs, the door hinges and teakettles are exactly where they were, but so is that special indefinable "Barnes" feeling. Except that it seems to have been dusted off, maybe shaken out in the fresh air, before being put back in place.

The paintings, too, are the same but a little different. Ellsworth Kelly, on a tour after the dedication of his sculpture— which looms over a pebble-filled pond by the entrance— insisted to Barnes director Derek Gillman that one of his favorite Picassos had been cleaned.

"No," Gillman responded, "We just brought the light in."

Room to breathe

And so they have. Features such as higher ceilings (but not so much that you really notice), generous wood-mullioned windows with a leafy garden prospect on the Parkway side, and a clerestory above the upper galleries give both art and visitors a bit more room to breathe without compromising the sacrosanct.

The new setting has been worth the wait. Room 1 still"“ or once again— hits you like a blast from a trumpet, a clarion call to open your eyes and expect to be amazed.

Matisse's The Dancers, created for the site, hovers in the arches above as you face the artist's great Moroccan portrait, Seated Ruffian, at your left and Picasso's The Peasants at your right. At one end, Cézanne's Large Bathers hangs with a family portrait by Renoir; at the other, Seurat's The Models is paired with Cézanne's Card Players, and behind you the display includes two of Cézanne's strongest portraits, Boy in a Red Vest and Woman in a Green Hat, a painting of the artist's wife.

Barnes's codes and puzzles

Because masterpieces hold supreme here, Room 1 may be the easiest room in the whole place. The hierarchy is obvious. Dr. Barnes didn't want to make it easy, however, and it gets harder as you follow through the rooms.

His system of hanging works in "ensembles" is intended to allow the art— including the fine crafts of metal, ceramic and wood— to trump any label, period, artistic chronology or assumed preference. Dr. Barnes himself seems just as much in place in the new galleries as the aura and the art; he is still prodding you, coaxing you to figure out his puzzles and codes.

How does this metal shape relate to the forms in this painting? How is the subject of this work expanded by the context of what he has placed around it, irrespective of time or place of origin? As a help, rooms are fitted with dark wood benches, simple and unobtrusive, and with brochures with colored photos and notes.

The next few weeks will bring huge numbers into the galleries: loyal admirers, curious newcomers and, no doubt, some opponents of the move ready to condemn the place just because it's there. Whichever group you're in, make sure you take the time to see what's really new at the Barnes, including the lounge and gift shop downstairs, where a glass-enclosed garden continues the theme of framing the new Barnes experience with light and greenery.

Caustic letters

Appreciate the clean, elegant building with its beautiful mixes of materials and textures and various garden areas and spaces. And if you want to better understand Dr. Barnes and his idiosyncratic ideas, don't miss "Ensembles," the fascinating, artfully conceived exhibit in the new temporary gallery. See pictures of his beloved dog, examine his correspondence with his mentor Leo Stein and with his Paris dealers, learn about Argyrol (the product that brought him the means to buy his art) and, best of all, read the rejections he wrote to high-toned folks who had the audacity to try to see it.

These witty caustic letters, typed by Barnes's own hand, will make you all the more grateful for the chance to see this quirky, breathtaking collection, intact and safe in its new home. They'll also make you very glad that you don't have to ask his permission.♦


To read another review by Steve Cohen, click here.