![]() The Athenaeum is an organization that has not stood still: We’ve changed our focus, our way of collecting, our physical space before.”Ī new living room pairs contemporary seating with an antique secretary and art from the Athenaeum’s collection. While the Athenaeum is steeped in strong traditions, says Rosovksy, “Changing is something we’ve always done. On the first floor, for example, a pair of landscapes by 19th-century Black artist Robert Duncanson take center stage, as do paintings by Bostonian Polly Thayer Starr, whose 80-year career began in the 1920s. While a large portion of the art collection includes formal portraiture by esteemed artists, including Gilbert Stuart and John Singer Sargent, emphasis has been put on highlighting a wider range of media, including works by women and people of color. Rosovsky and the Athenaeum’s curators have also re-envisioned how the institution’s collections are presented and interpreted to reflect a more expansive view of American art and history. Living rooms provide areas for interaction, a new gallery where rotating exhibits can be experienced has been added, and a ground-level 40-seat café is slated to open later this year. A new children’s library has been reimagined along with a study center designed to accommodate researchers and school groups to better engage with the Athenaeum’s materials. While the Athenaeum’s traditional reading rooms are unaltered, other spaces were enhanced to maximize its cultural programming, including year-round author talks, gallery exhibitions, concerts, and social events. “We were also interested in presenting ourselves as a more open and welcoming institution.” It was clear that they wanted more casual spaces, more places to converge,” Rosovsky says. ![]() “The critical focus was meeting our members’ needs. ![]() Kicking off the project was among Athenaeum director Leah Rosovsky’s first tasks when she came on board in 2020. The recent $17 million renovation involved a 12,000-square-foot expansion into the adjacent building, 14 Beacon. The new children’s library features a newly commissioned mural by Ekua Holmes, a lifelong resident of Boston’s Roxbury neighborhood. While a chemistry laboratory never came to fruition when it was on Pearl Street, the Athenaeum added the gallery where exhibitions of American and European art appealed to the city’s cultural enthusiasts. War correspondent Margaret Fuller joined shortly afterward, as did author-and voracious reader-Louisa May Alcott. ![]() It was housed in a mansion on Pearl Street when historian Hannah Adams became the first woman to obtain membership in 1829. Throughout the first part of the 19th century, the Athenaeum inhabited various locations in Boston. Among the nation’s largest independent membership libraries and one of its first, the Boston Athenaeum was founded in 1807 by a group of local (male) intellectuals who sought an establishment where they could gather among bookshelves containing the “great works of learning and science in all languages.” The vision would expand to include a gallery of sculptures and paintings, collections of coins and natural curiosities, and even a laboratory. ![]() The Boston Athenaeum isn’t the inner sanctum you may think it is-although it did start out that way. ![]()
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