 Arts & Culture: The Walters Art Museum exhibits artwork and objects that go back 5,500 years. Building a vacation around this diverse museum, would offer travelers an unparalleled education of the history of art. This amazing museum, which is located in the
Mount Vernon Cultural District of Baltimore, Maryland, has over 22,000 works of art and approximately 28,000
displayed objects.
Its Ancient Americas collection has gold and jewelry that was removed from tombs of royalty. The Ancient Asia collection shows the oldest Buddha ever
recovered, going back to 6th century AD of the Sui and T'ang dynasties. This is one of the only museums worldwide with such a thorough and comprehensive history of art with pieces ranging from the third millennium BC to the early 20th century. The museum offers vast works from Egyptian, Greek, Byzantine,
Ethiopian, Roman and western medieval art collections.
Some of the 19th century exhibits offer a historical perspective of the growth of the United States and its formation as a nation, such as the exhibit of Alfred Jacob Miller and the Western Indians. In 1837 Captain William Drummond Stewart, a Scottish adventurer,
commissioned Mr. Miller to capture the journey of a group of animal-fur traders traveling through the Green River Valley, which is now western Wyoming. Over 200 of Miller's trial sketches were commissioned. Tribes of Sioux, Bannock, Mandan, Crow, Snake, Pend Oreilles, Nez Percé, Cheyenne, and Delaware were some of the Native Americans represented in these 19th
century works. Miller subsequently turned his sketches into both oil and watercolor paintings.
The Himalayan Art collection of John and Berthe Ford contains pieces that are among the most important private holdings of Indian and Himalayan art in the world. Other collections of great historical value include manuscripts from Germany, India, Ethiopia, Persia, and England. The Walters Art Museum holds the finest collection of ivories, jewelry, enamels and bronzes in America. It also has a spectacular reserve of noteworthy manuscripts and very rare books.
The Peabody Court is the official hotel of the Walters Art Museum. The museum's website offers info on past, current, and future exhibits plus an online store. A cornucopia of stunning virtual-tour options is just a click away. Check it out.
For LxM James Rothaar |