Boya Yu

Review of Barnes Foundation

As a visitor and art lover, I stayed in Philadelph...

As a visitor and art lover, I stayed in Philadelphia for only one day. I spent 3 hours in Philadelphia Museum of Art and 1 hour here. It's totally wrong! If I visit Philadelphia next time, I will spend only 1 hour in PMA but 3 hours (or more) here!

There're tons of masterpieces hanging on the walls, especially the paintings by Renoir, Matisse, Picasso, Rousseau, Modigliani, van Gogh and Seurat. Because the founder Dr. Barnes prohibited the loan of works in the collection, it's impossible to see these pieces anywhere else.

I really appreciate the way they display and arrange the paintings, works by different artists, across different ages and even different cultures hanging on the same wall, thus you can compare and connect them. Also I love the elegant guide book putting in each room, if you want to find the author of any painting, just take a look. I'd like to buy a set of all these guide books, but the price is too high ($275 total)!

Now I'm on the bus to NYC, I do envy the Philadelphians, I wish I could be a Philadelphian, then I will visit here every week, take a seat and have a look.