Virginia Museum of Fine Arts - Permanent Collection

Permanent Collection

The Virginia Museum of Fine Arts has divided its encyclopedic collections into several broad curatorial departments, which largely correspond to the galleries:

• African Art: In 1994 and 1995, the museum exhibited its entire 250-object African art collection in "Spirit of the Motherland: African Art at the Virginia Museum of Fine Arts." As of 2011, the collection has grown to around 500 objects, with particular strengths in the art of the Kuba, the Akan, the Yoruba, and the Kongo peoples, and the art of Mali.

• American art: The American art collection began with twenty works of the John Barton Payne donation. Since the 1980s, the museum has begun to systematically build its holdings in American art, aided in 1988 by the creation of an endowment to make such acquisitions by patrons Harwood and Louise Cochrane.

In 2005, the McGlothlin family promised a bequest of their collection of American art and financial support, valued at well above $100 million.

• Ancient American art

• Ancient art: Begun in 1936, the Ancient collection expanded under Director Leslie Cheek, with the advice of the Brooklyn Museum and other institutions. The collection consists of works from the Ancient Egyptian, Ancient Greek, Phrygian, Etruscan, Ancient Roman, and Byzantine civilizations. It includes one of two ancient Egyptian mummies in the city of Richmond, "Tjeby" (the other is at the University of Richmond).

• Art Nouveau & Art Deco: Begun from the core collection of furniture and decorative arts the Lewis family began assembling in 1971; today it includes Art Nouveau works by Hector Guimard, Emile Galle, Louis Majorelle, Louis Comfort Tiffany, works by the Vienna Secession and Peter Behrens, Arts & Crafts works by Charles Renee Mackintosh, Frank Lloyd Wright, Stickley, and Greene & Greene, and Parisian Art Deco pieces by Eileen Gray and Émile-Jacques Ruhlmann.

• East Asian art: Begun in 1941, the East Asian collection consists of Chinese, Japanese and Korean art. The collection includes Chinese jade, bronzes and Buddhist sculpture, Japanese sculpture, paintings from Kyoto, as well as Korean ceramics and bronzes from two private collections. In 2004, the collection added two stunning imperial Buddhist paintings from the Qing dynasty, dating from 1740. The collection also includes the Rene and Carolyn Balcer Collection of works by the Japanese woodblock artist Kawase Hasui – that collection consists of some 800 works, woodblock prints, screens, watercolors and other works by Hasui, including beautiful rarely-seen prints made by Hasui prior to the 1923 earthquake that destroyed half of Tokyo.

• European art: The European collection began with the original 1919 Payne donation, and has since grown to include works by Bacchiacca, Murillo, Poussin, Rosa, Gentileschi, Goya,and Bouguereau.

In 1970, Ailsa Mellon Bruce donated some 450 European decorative objects, including a group of 18th- and 19th-century gold, porcelain and enamel boxes.

Paul Mellon's donations added to this French Impressionist and Post-Impressionist works and a collection of British Sporting Art, given to the museum in 1983. At his death in 1999, Mellon bequeathed additional French and British works, including five paintings by George Stubbs.

• English silver: In 1997 a collection of 18th and 19th century English silver was given to the museum by Jerome and Rita Gans.

• Fabergé The Pratt Fabergé collection includes five Imperial Easter Eggs: the Rock Crystal Egg of 1896, the Pelican Egg of 1898, the Peter the Great Egg of 1903, the Tsarevich Egg of 1912, and the Red Cross with Imperial Portraits Egg of 1915.

• The South Asian collection comprises works from what is today India, Pakistan, Bangladesh, Sri Lanka, Nepal and Tibet. The collection began in the late 1960s, with the initial core of the Himalayan collection coming in 1968. When the 2010 wing was completed, a 27-ton marble late-Mughal garden pavilion from Rajasthan was installed inside the galleries.

• Modern & Contemporary: The core of the Modern & Contemporary collection was assembled by Sydney and Frances Lewis in the mid- to late-20th century. Much of the more than 1,200 works in their collection were acquired by trading products (such as appliances and electronics) from their company, Best Products, to artists in exchange for works, while at the same time befriending many of them.