Rembrant to Renoir

• July 30, 2009
• Rated 5 of 5 by Victoria Adamson from Georgetown, Texas

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Blanton Art Museum

• March 14, 2007
• Rated 4 of 5 by zabelle from Portland, Connecticut

First let me warn you that parking here is a bear. It’s not that there isn’t parking, there is not only a large outdoor lot across the street, there is a parking garage almost next door. The problem is that they are both full. We refused to take no for an answer with the parking garage. You can talk to someone on an intercom and we keep trying to talk them into letting us in until they did and we found a parking spot so we were right, the lot wasn’t totally full.

Plans for a museum at the University of Texas at Austin began in 1927 when Archer M. Huntingon made a donation of some land to fund an art museum. It took 11 years for a College of Fine Arts to be founded. In 1963 a small museum was opened, and noted author James Michener and his wife Mari donated a collection of 20th-century American art that substantially improved the collection. So much so that they had to move to a larger building in 1972.

In April 2006 the new Blanton Musuem of Art opened. Designed by Kallman, McKinnell, and Wood, the New Mari and James A. Michener Gallery houses the museum's permanent collection on the second floor. The building is constructed of Texas limestone, granite, and South American epp wood with a Spanish tile roof. In 2008 a new building which will house a café, store, and auditorium will open and make the Blanton the largest university art museum in the country.

The Jack S. Blanton Museum is also the home of the Suida-Manning Collection of European Art. This collection brought this museum to a whole new level. They now have the eighth largest collection of Italian old masters outside of Europe. Their collection of 17th-century French paintings is only surpassed by the Metropolitan Museum. The collection is comprised of 250 paintings, 400 drawings, and 20 sculptures. It is made up of German, French, and Italian art from the 14th through 18th centuries. They went on display in 1999 and are an amazing collection. Many of the items are by lesser known artists whose work is seldom seen outside of Italy, but one painting has been identified as being by Parmiganinno and is only the third one in this country.

We got off the elevator and fell in love with the beautiful museum. Some wonderful and unexpected English portraits were the first thing we saw. The whole feeling is light and airy with high ceilings and amazing arches and angles.

There are rooms of the fantastic European collection followed by rooms of amazing prints. Mixed in there is a small amount of antiquities.

On to the modern works and one where you actually can walk into it. This museum is a winner and a must-see for anyone going to Austin.

There is a small gift shop on the first floor.

From journal Austin-It's SOCO-ol

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Blanton Museum

• July 5, 2006
• Rated 5 of 5 by Meg-a-Traveler from Houston, Texas

From journal Lost in Austin

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