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FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
April 28, 2008

PRESS CONTACT:           
Andrea Potochniak
607 254-4563
arp37@cornell.edu

Public celebration will be held on Saturday, May 17
featuring a live performance by the Burns Sisters

Ithaca, NY—The Herbert F. Johnson Museum of Art at Cornell University is celebrating the groundbreaking of the new wing with two events in May.

The public is invited to attend a groundbreaking and 35th anniversary celebration on Saturday, May 17 from 1:00 to 3:00 p.m., featuring a live concert performance by the Burns Sisters. The free event will also feature art activities and refreshments.

A private groundbreaking event will be held on Friday, May 16 for media and invited guests, including Ithaca Mayor Carolyn Peterson and Cornell President David Skorton.

“The mission of the new wing is to serve the collection and the public, allowing our visitors to use more of the collection more intimately and in new ways,” said Frank Robinson, the Richard J. Schwartz Director of the Johnson Museum.

The wing will add approximately 16,000 gross square feet to the existing 61,000 square feet in the first expansion of the Museum since opening in 1973. The wing will include a 150-seat lecture room, a workshop studio, new galleries, art storage, and office space. Concurrent renovations to the existing building will create additional exhibition space in the fifth-floor Asian art galleries and reconfigure the lowest public floor to include a study center with open storage, a photographic study room, and a seminar room.

“We’re excited that we’ll be able to provide greater access to the collection for the public through the open storage study center, which will feature several hundred works of African, pre-Columbian, Asian, and decorative arts,” said Cathy Klimaszewski, associate director and the Harriett Ames Charitable Trust Curator of Education. “Over the past decade our educational programming has increased dramatically, and we look forward to using these new spaces to better serve our growing audience on campus and from the community.”

The extension has been designed by the architects of the original Johnson Museum building, Pei Cobb Freed & Partners, and the original architect-in-charge, John Sullivan, Cornell Class of 1962. Its concept is based on the original I. M. Pei design for the Museum, which included an underground extension to the north.

About $19 million of the approximately $20 million total cost has been raised to date. The Museum has been awarded challenge grants for the project by the Kresge Foundation of Michigan and the National Endowment for the Humanities.

NEH Chair Bruce Cole noted in his 2006 award letter, “[Evaluators] praised the Museum’s programming overall…. The new wing was deemed a much-needed and imaginative response to the academic demands on the Museum, and is appropriately adapted to the Museum’s landmark building.”

Construction is expected to be completed in Spring 2010, pending municipal approvals, with a public opening that fall.

The Johnson Museum has a permanent collection of over 30,000 works of art from Africa, Asia, Europe, and North and South America. The museum building was designed by I. M. Pei. Funds for the building were donated by Cornell alumnus Herbert F. Johnson, late president and chairman of S C Johnson. The building opened in 1973.

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The Herbert F. Johnson Museum of Art, located on the campus of Cornell University, is open Tuesdays to Sundays from 10:00 a.m. to 5:00 p.m. Admission is free. The Museum is completely accessible for mobility-impaired visitors, and a wheelchair is available in the lobby. Metered parking is available in the lot next to the Museum. For more information, please call 607 255-6464. Visit the Museum’s website at www.museum.cornell.edu. The Herbert F. Johnson Museum of Art is a proud member of Ithaca’s Discovery Trail: www.DiscoveryTrail.com.

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