Info about the Frick
 

When the Frick came up in my 2019 trip report, annhig kindly noted that it would be closed for repairs. I had lunch with a pal who just visited it in its temporary digs. She really enjoyed it. So, you'll miss the beauty of the mansion, but can still see the collection.

From Frick.org:
"Frick Collection announced details of its two-year installation plan for Frick Madison, the institution’s temporary home while its historic buildings at 1 East 70th Street undergo renovation. Anticipated to open in early 2021 and remain operating for the duration of construction, Frick Madison will occupy the Marcel Breuer–designed building on Madison Avenue, formerly home to the Whitney Museum of American Art and most recently The Met Breuer. For the first time, audiences will be able to enjoy a substantial gathering of highlights from the collection outside the domestic setting of the Frick’s Gilded Age mansion, only five blocks away. In a departure from the Frick’s customary presentation style, works will be organized chronologically and by region. The exhibition will feature treasured paintings and sculptures by Bellini, Clodion, Gainsborough, Goya, Holbein, Houdon, Ingres, Piero della Francesca, Rembrandt, Titian, Turner, Velázquez, Vermeer, Whistler, and many others, alongside impressive holdings in the decorative arts. Rarely displayed works will include important seventeenth-century Mughal carpets and long-stored canvases from the famed series by Jean-Honoré Fragonard, to be shown together in its entirety for the first time in the Frick’s history."

I was at the Frick just before the pandemic shut things down and have been looking forward to visiting the collection in its new temporary home. The Times gave it a good review when it opened.

"The backdrop is gray, the lighting sober. No barriers. No protective glass. No descriptive texts. (And no selfies, either — as at the mother ship, at Frick Madison photography is banned too.) New York’s most majestic Bellini, most lavish Rembrandt, most sharply cut Ingres have been unencumbered, made strange. Frick Madison is European art history distilled, and it’s a swaggering wager on the collection’s sufficiency and an audience’s attention span. You can study up via print, app or video, but your primordial task here is to look, look, look."

The Frick was one of my favorite museums ever. Along with the Bargello and Somerset House, I think the smaller sizes made it easier to navigate and concentrate.

I may have mentioned Cocktails with a Curator in an earlier thread. Great way to become acquainted with objects in the collection of the Frick.

https://www.frick.org/interact/minis...ktails_curator

Hoping to do a day trip to see the collection in its temporary location.

Actually, it was Gwendolynn who posted the earlier thread.

https://www.fodors.com/community/fod...overs-1697007/

Very cool, k_marie.

Thanks for the info. The Frick is maybe my favorite museum of all. If I get up there during construction, I'd like to see the temporary location too.

On my visit 18 months ago [feels longer somehow] I managed to get there at just the right time for a tour by one of the guides which was very useful as i had known nothing of the history of the collection before that. I keep meaning to tune into cocktails with a curator but not managed it yet.