Old Masters, New World: America's Raid on Europe's Great Pictures

Old Masters, New World is 'light' reading by design, popular cultural history, an entertaining group biography of the Daddy Warbucks art collectors who emerged from America's Gilded Age with millions to spend on the sort of Art that would dignify their wealth and possibly erase the public image of their rapacious greed. In effect, the Economic Elite wielded their millions to assert themselves as the Cultural Elite, with the toady help of the Intellectual Elite, for the paternalistic benefit of the 99% of Americans who weren't Elite in any fashion. WE the latter thank them, to be sure, when we worshipfully elbow each other through the museums of New York, Boston, DC, Chicago - the mausoleums of their inordinate pride.The great purchasers portrayed in this book, AKA the Robber Barons, were Henry Marquand, Isabella Stewart Gardiner, JP Mrgan, Harry Havemeyer, and -- most vividly and extensively -- Henry Clay Frick, the arch-villain of labor exploitation who callously incited the most violent incident of strike-breaking in American history. Author Cynthia Saltzman treats most of her moneybag subjects with a certain gentle 'detachment' but she plainly finds Frick hard to love. Her brief account of the Homestead Strike is less condemnatory than her depiction of Frick's egotism, his monumental sense of entitlement, his stingy bullying of living artists and art-dealers in his pursuit of the works of the dead Masters whose portraits of aristocrats 'validated' his own grandeur. The museum that Frick built, on the east side of Central Park in New York, by the by, is one of my favorites in the world. I go there whenever I have a 'day off' in the Big Apple, to gaze lovingly at the Vermeers, El Grecos, and Turners. I try not to disrupt my appreciation with thoughts about the odd compatibility of art and evil.Saltzman also depicts the art-dealers and professional connoisseurs who selected and supplied the "Old Masters" to their eager American clients, whom they did their very best to 'fleece' as often as possible. As usual, the 'aesthetes' held the plutocrats in amused contempt. The most contemptuous, and contemptible, of the lot was Bernard Berenson, who cozened and cheated Isabella Stewart Gardiner shamelessly. Berenson's books on the painters of the Italian Renaissance were still part of the 'canon' of genteel genius when I was a student in Boston in the early 1960's, though his reputation had already been tarnished. Even today I hate to treat Berenson disloyally; after all, I've spent several exhilarating sojourns at his villa 'I Tatti' near Florence, which is now operated as an institute by Harvard University. But he was a self-serving scamp for certain."Old Masters, New World" is not a history of art or a examination of aesthetics. It's a social history of the extended generation, from the end of the Civil War in the USA to the catastrophe of World War 1, which saw America rise to global economic might, and subsequently to the crude cultural arrogance portrayed in the novels of Henry James and Mark Twain. James, as one would expect, pops out of the closet here and there in Saltzman's narrative.Saltzman writes deftly and colorfully, making her scholarship pleasant enough to read merely as a tale of adventure in the marketplace. It's definitely a worthwhile choice for anyone who enjoys a museum visit now and then, and who has ever wondered how the immense collections of the Met or the National Gallery were assembled. It's a story of pillage, to be blunt. The book's subtitle says it plainly: America's RAID on Europe's great pictures.

This is a marvelous account of how America managed, in only 60 years; to acquire a major collection of old masters paintings in the Metropolitan Museum of Art, the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum, the National Gallery, and my personal favorite, the Frick Museum. There were a number of factors involved. Not only were the rich getting richer in America, but the old line aristocracy was getting poorer due to electoral reform and people voting for their own interests. In order to pay high taxes on the wealthy, works of art had to be sold in the event that a stray American heiress could not be found to marry the second son of the family.The cast of characters in this book is impressive. There is Isabella Stewart Gardner herself who manages to get in on the ground floor in acquiring an impressive array of masterpieces. Like all the other members of this story, it was her insistence on quality that led her to seek out some of the most impressive works of art available to the collector at the turn of the last century. Gardner unfortunately was unable really to take advantage of some of the paintings on offer because she did not command the vast resources of some of her rivals in the acquisition of great pictures. She would have had more resources had she not relied on Bernard Berenson who frequently would increase the price of a picture to permit himself several thousand dollars in walking around money. This practice of Berenson was brought to light by more than one of his biographers. One of Berenson's fellow art dealers, Joseph Duveen was not much better. Berenson was a scholar of Italian painting; Duveen was decorator who was looking at paintings as a way to sell antique French and Italian furniture (not all of which was really antique).Probably the most interesting person involved in the acquisition of paintings was Henry Clay Frick who eventually constructed what became the Frick museum. Though vastly more wealthy than Mrs. Gardner, he was always anxious to try and undercut the seller, being every bit as difficult in the purchase of painting as he was in breaking strikes.Along with Frick, there is J.P. Morgan who was so rich he kept his collection of Old Masters in London until he could persuade congress to cancel the import duties on works of art over 20 years old. It is a reflection both on Morgan and congress that it was cheaper to get congress to pass a law in the gilded age than to pay import duties.If anyone is interesting in learning how so many fine works of art came to the United States between 1860-1920, this a great book to read, filled as it is with all the intrigue of one of the deals that Frick, Gardner, Morgan or any of the other millionaires in the book would have struck.

Interesting account of how America was able to acquire the paintings of old masters. Lots of facts, but basically very good.

On page 42, the author cites Filippo Lippi as the artist who painted the work that was initially and wrongly attributed to Masaccio. It is useful to read the entire book!

I found this story fascinating both as a character study and a history of how America came into possession of so many great European works of art. I have an in depth background in art but this gave me a totally new perspective about the people and the works they came to possess. Like so many other art majors we had been led to subscribe to the "connoisseurship" of Berenson and Duveen but this book gave us an insider's view of their wheeling and dealing. I found it a page turner and a thrilling account of this period in American history

Very interesting read, even for thoughs who are not art educated or enthusiasts, like myself. Deeply appreciated the history aspect. My only negative comment is I felt it was a little all over the place with dates and a little hard to follow because of that. Oh, and for you Kindle users, there are pictures at the end.

There is a lot of information in this book and it is well researched. Perhaps a bit too much on the gossipy side about the patrons and the descriptions of some of the works of art are too long-winded with flowery phrases but the book is essentially fascinating.

The enormous wealth and insatiable drive of American collectors brought some of the greatest paintings in the world to ultimately be the treasures of the country's museums and accessible to the public.