Museum of Fine Arts Boston, Art museum in Fenway-Kenmore, Boston, US
The Museum of Fine Arts Boston is an art museum in the Fenway-Kenmore neighborhood of Boston and covers three floors with several wings divided by geographic collection. The exhibition spaces contain works from different eras, ranging from ancient Egyptian objects to contemporary painting and photography.
The institution was established in 1870 and initially occupied a different site in the city before moving to the current building on Huntington Avenue in 1909. Architect Guy Lowell designed the neoclassical structure, which was later expanded with modern wings.
The building displays paintings and sculptures from Europe, America and Asia in rooms organized by region and period. Visitors can examine scrolls, ceramics and textiles showing daily life and religious themes in the Japanese art galleries.
The museum stands on Huntington Avenue in the Fenway–Kenmore neighborhood, reached by the MBTA Green Line E branch at the Museum of Fine Arts stop; through trains on the E branch need no change at Copley. The entrances on Huntington Avenue and Fenway were redesigned with gardens and access roads. The Linde Family Wing, designed by I. M. Pei, holds the cafe, restaurant, classrooms and bookstore.
The Japanese collection, the largest outside Japan, owes much to Edward Sylvester Morse, who sold about 5,000 Japanese ceramics to the museum in 1892. Morse, a zoologist, had come to Japan to collect brachiopods and found the Omori shell mound from a train window in 1877. His ceramics were classified by production site and style, and he wrote the catalogue himself.
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