Living Experiences of a Bygone Age

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Abstract

The extraordinary salvaging of fragmentary pieces of medieval stonework in France by the American sculptor George Grey Barnard (1863–1938) began as a treasure hunt and led to the founding of a public museum in 1914 situated in Upper Manhattan. The museum was bought in 1925 by the American financier and philanthropist John D. Rockefeller Jr (1874–1960) and donated to The Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York. This article will consider how the fragmentary nature of these displaced medieval monuments, brought across the Atlantic by Barnard, were afforded a statement of validity and authenticity by the institution of a museum. The reassembly of dispersed pieces of medieval art and architecture created an atmospherically focused museum design which gained influence during the 1920s and 1930s in the United States of America. This article will consider how The Cloisters as a museum sought to construct an authentic understanding of medieval art and the impact this had on visitor experience.