Richard L. Feigen Collection and Yale University Art Gallery

Where I was in New York earlier this month, I took the opportunity to visit Yale University Art Gallery, where a special exhibit of Italian Paintings from the Richard L. Feigen Collection of Italian paintings was on display and had garnered great reviews. 

According to the Art Gallery's introduction, "Italian Paintings from the Richard L. Feigen Collection features some 50 paintings from the 14th through the 17th century by such celebrated artists as Taddeo Gaddi, Orcagna, Lorenzo Monaco, Fra Angelico, Annibale and Ludovico Carracci, Domenichino, Guercino, and Orazio Gentileschi. The exhibition draws from the wide-ranging collection assembled by noted author, collector, and dealer Richard L. Feigen, B.A. 1952, which has never before been catalogued or exhibited in its entirety. This presentation provides a rare opportunity for Gallery visitors to view significant examples of Italian art, ranging from the greatest of Giotto’s followers to the Baroque masters of Bologna, Rome, and Florence. The exhibition is accompanied by a fully illustrated catalogue, copublished with Yale University Press, with a preface by Feigen and entries by Laurence Kanter and John Marciari"

There were many beautiful paintings and due to their ages, they often looked very strange and required a great command of iconography of the past to understand them fuller.  Not being a scholar in earlier Italian paintings was a hindrance for me to understand the importance of this group works but it didn't deter me from appreciate their eerie beauty.


The Annunciatory Angel, 1387, Niccolò di Pietro Gerini


"Saint Sixtus, circa 1453–54, Fra Angelico


Virgin and Child with Two Angels circa 1460–70, follower of Paolo Uccello


Virgin and Child with Saint Lucy and the Young Saint John the Baptist, circa 1587–88, Annibale Carracci


Christ Carrying the Cross, circa 1591–95, Alessandro Allori


Danaë and the Shower of Gold, 1621-22, Orazio Gentileschi

After viewing the special exhibit, I spent a couple more hours to see the gallery's permanent collection.  According the the gallery, it collects over 185,000 works. European paintings, from iconic period to the modern time, were my initial focus as usual.  I found the images below were most interesting, including those by Fra Angelico, Bosch, Holbein, Rubens, Van Dyck, Hals, Manet, Cézanne, Van Gogh, Hopper and Kiefer.


Three Princesses, c. 1325-35, Tino di Camaino


The Assumption of the Virgin, 1362, Luca di Tommè


"The Annunciation, c. 1423-25, Fra Angelico


Virgin and Child, c. 1460-65, Neri di Bicci, Desiderio da Settignano, God the Father with Adoring Angels and Seraphim, 1472, Neri di Bicci


The Annunciation, c. 1480, Nerocio de Landi


An Allegory of Intemperance, c. 1495-1500, Hieronymus Bosch


A Hanseatic Merchant, 1538, Hans Holbein the Younger


The Crucifixion with the Converted Centurion, 1538, Lucas Cranach the Elder


The Brothel Scene, c. 1540, The Brunswick Monogrammist


Virgin and Child, known as the Madonna del Libro, c. 1545-46, Jacopo Carucci, called Pontormo


Portrait of a Man, c. 1615, Peter Paul Rubens


The Assumption of the Virgin, 1636-38, Peter Paul Rubens, and The Ecstasy of Saint Augustine, 1628, Anthony van Dyck


De Heer Bodolphe, 1643 and Mevrouw Bodolphe, 1643, Frans Hals


Young Woman Reclining in Spanish Costume, 1862-63, Édouard Manet


Bouteille, verre, et citrons (Bottle, Glass, and Lemons), c. 1867-69, Paul Cézanne


Le café de nuit (The Night Café), 1888, Vincent van Gogh


The Play Scene in Hamlet (Act III, Scene 2), 1897, Edwin Austin Abbey


The Forest, 1935, Paul Delvaux


Interior at Le Cannet, 1938, Pierre Bonnard


Rooms by the Sea, 1951, Edward Hopper


Rooms by the Sea (detail), 1951, Edward Hopper


Die Ungeborenen (The Unborn), 2001, Anselm Kiefer

This art gallery also boasts artifacts from ancient worlds, ranging from Mideast, Far East, Roman Empire, America and Africa. The crowning piece to be is the Relief from the Palace of Assurnasirpal II at Nimrud below, dated 883-859 B.C. 


Relief from the Palace of Assurnasirpal II at Nimrud, depitcting a Human-Headed Genie Watering a Sacred Tree, 883-859 B.C.








Portrait of Caligula (Roman emperor A.D. 37-41) Roman, A.D. 37-41









Finally, a few contemporary sculptures in the gallery and the sculpture garden rounded up this rather substantial collection.


Sunflower, 2005, Sugiura Yasuyoshi


Cubi XXII, 1964, David Smith


Le prix, 2006, Martin Puryear


It is an amazingly large collection, with those marquee names mentioned above.  However, I did find that it has spread thin, without much depth of any direction. This slight deficiency is common amongst university museums, however rich they are, such as Cantor Arts Center at Stanford University in the west coast, which however has an incredibly large Rodin's sculpture collection to counter such charge.

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