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Catalog Data

Creator:
Gardner, Isabella Stewart, 1840-1924  Search this
Names:
Duveen Brothers  Search this
Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum  Search this
Museum of Fine Arts, Boston  Search this
Berenson, Bernard, 1865-1959  Search this
Extent:
40 Microfilm reels
Type:
Collection descriptions
Archival materials
Microfilm reels
Date:
1760-1956
Scope and Contents:
Letters, business records, diary, and photographs.
REEL 380-413: Primarily correspondence, mostly Gardner's own, but including family correspondence and Gardner Museum correspondence.
REELS 631-632: Personal papers of Gardner and some records of the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum including dealers' files containing invoices, notes, cancelled checks, and letters; a record book, "Prices Paid for Paintings," 1917; a record book, "Prices Paid for Works of Art"; 118 installation photographs of the museum as arranged by Gardner, 1924; a diary kept in Egypt, 1874, with sketches; a diary kept in Shanghai and India, 1883-1884; "Directions for my funeral," 1912; and "Suggestions for Running a Museum," 1913.
REELS 696-698: Letters from Bernard Berenson to Gardner, 1887-1924. Letters contain references to literary topics, Berenson's impressions of Europe, various paintings and artists, advice to Gardner on the purchase of paintings and information on their sale.
REEL 846: Checklist of Gardner's letters to Bernard and Mary Berenson, 1894-1924; typescripts of personal and official correspondence (originals found on AAA microfilm reels 696-698), 1887-1924.
Biographical / Historical:
Isabella Stewart Gardner was an art patron, collector, and museum founder in Boston, Mass. Immediately after graduation from Harvard, Bernard Berenson was hired by Gardner to travel throughout Italy collecting Italian Renaissance art for her recreated Venetian palazzo in Boston. She established her palazzo as a museum of fine European art with stipulations that after her death none of the exhibited works was to be moved or rearranged, but left as she had designed during her lifetime.
Provenance:
Microfilm lent by Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum for duplicating, 1972-1975.
Restrictions:
The Archives of American art does not own the original papers. Use is limited to the microfilm copy.
Occupation:
Art patrons -- Massachusetts -- Boston  Search this
Topic:
Art -- Collectors and collecting -- Massachusetts -- Boston  Search this
Art, Renaissance -- Massachusetts -- Boston  Search this
Art, Italian -- Italy -- Venice  Search this
Painting, Renaissance  Search this
Sculpture, Renaissance  Search this
Function:
Art museums -- Massachusetts -- Boston
Identifier:
AAA.gardisab
See more items in:
Isabella Stewart Gardner papers
Archival Repository:
Archives of American Art
GUID:
https://n2t.net/ark:/65665/mw92b22555a-93d8-4bb4-84dc-7a55d64712db
EDAN-URL:
ead_collection:sova-aaa-gardisab