Barnes Foundation, Art museum on Benjamin Franklin Parkway, Philadelphia, United States.
The Barnes Foundation is an art museum on Benjamin Franklin Parkway in Philadelphia, holding more than 4,000 objects, among them over 900 paintings by Impressionist, Post-Impressionist and Modern artists. Its building is a large box clad in pale-grey limestone panels set in a grid, with vertical seams dividing the stone into rectangles. Two vertical window recesses sit on the left side of the main facade and a taller recessed opening near the centre; an attached section above and to the right is glazed in translucent panels with metal frames, and a black lamppost stands in front.
Albert Barnes founded the institution in 1922 in Merion, a suburb west of Philadelphia, to use his collection for educational purposes. In 2012, the museum moved into a new building in the center of the city, ending years of legal disputes.
The paintings hang in dense arrangements, often spanning multiple walls, so that a canvas appears beside an African mask or a wrought iron grille. This presentation follows the idea that artworks speak to one another and comment on each other.
The museum opens Thursday through Monday between 11:00 AM and 5:00 PM, and advance reservations are recommended. The rooms are wheelchair accessible, and signage guides visitors through the different floors.
Each room follows a fixed arrangement that Barnes himself designed and that cannot be changed after his death. The furniture, metalwork, and decorative objects are integral parts of each ensemble and not mere accessories.
The community of curious travelers
AroundUs brings together thousands of curated places, local tips, and hidden gems, enriched daily by 93,367 contributors worldwide.
