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THE NEW YORK TIMES, THURSDAY, APRIL 4, 1935.


$3,600,000 GIFTS OF J. D. ROCKEFELLER JR. TO THE MUSEUM OF ART


[[image - drawing of the proposed new Cloisters Building]]
[[credit]]Photos by courtesy of the Museum of Art.[[/credit]]
[[caption]]Architect's drawing, by C. Collens, of the proposed new Cloisters Building to be erected in Fort Tryon Park, the former estate of C. K. G. Billings on Washington Heights, at a cost of $2,500,000.[[/caption]]

[[image - black & white photograph of French fifteenth century tapestries, "The Hunt of the Unicorn,"]]
[[caption]]One of the series of six French fifteenth century tapestries, "The Hunt of the Unicorn," for which Mr. Rockefeller paid $1,100,000, which he has now presented to the museum to be placed in a special room of the new Cloisters. The photograph shows the unicorn being brought to the lady of the castle.[[/caption]]

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MUSEUM WILL GET $2,500,000 CLOISTER

By THOMAS C. LINN.
Continued From Page One.

Fort Tryon Park, covering about four acres."

"Greatest Examples" of Art.

Pointing out that the "priceless tapestries, together with the famous Unicorn Tapestries in the Cluny Museum [Paris] are among the greatest examples of this art dating from the fifteenth century," Mr. Blumenthal continued:

"The Metropolitan Museum of Art, the City of New York, and I may say without exaggeration all those interested in art and education in any part of the world owe a great debt of gratitude to Mr. Rockefeller for making possible the construction of the new Cloisters and for giving to the public the opportunity of seeing and studying these great tapestries. Work on the new Cloisters will begin at once and we hope that the construction may be completed in about three years."

Not only will the new building house the Gothic art in the present Cloisters building but also many other objects presented by Mr. Rockefeller and others from time to time for which there is no display space and which are now in storage.

Many of the architectural elements of the new structure actually have come from old monastic buildings in France, such as windows and doors and even whole walls.

"Where such material is lacking, as little new carving and ornamentation as possible will be created." Herbert E. Winlock, director of the museum, explained in a statement issued yesterday. "Original material - sculptures, frescoes, glass and tapestries - is to be the chief feature of the new Cloisters, set in a structure the design, material and texture of which are planned primarily as a background for the collections."

In accordance with the wish of Mr. Rockefeller and the trustees, work will begin at once on the new building in the expectation of completing it and installing the collections by Jan. 1, 1938. Charles Collens of the firm of Allen, Collens & Willis of Boston has drawn up the plans in collaboration with the staff of the museum. The firm of Marc Eidlitz & Son of this city will construct the building.

Memorial on Old Site.

When the Cloisters collection is moved to its new home, the present building and grounds will revert to George Grey Barnard, the sculptor, who has announced his intention of using this as a site for his Rainbow Arch, which he wishes to give the city as a war memorial.

It was through a gift of $600,000 from Mr. Rockefeller that the Metropolitan acquired the Cloisters ten years ago. This most important collection of Romanesque and Gothic sculpture in America had been assembled by Mr. Barnard

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and opened to the public in 1914, in a small building adjacent to his own residence.

"Many stories have been told about Mr. Barnard's collecting during the years he spent in France for the Harrisburg Capitol," Mr. Winlock recalled in his statement. "Some of his purchases came from barns and pigsties, for the building of which, in past generations, the ruins of churches and monasteries destroyed during the wars and religion and social revolution had frequently been regarded as convenient stone quarries."

Mr. Barnard offered for sale in 1922 the collection housed in the Cloisters. Not only did Mr. Rockefeller purchase the collection but he added an endowment fund for its maintenance, and when the building was opened in 1926 as a branch of the Metropolitan, Mr. and Mrs. Rockefeller supplemented the collection with a gift of forty-two sculptures. 

Offered Tract as Park.

In June, 1930, Mr. Rockefeller offered to give the city for use as a public park a fifty-six-acre tract of land on Washington Heights, including the Billings estate, which he had purchased in 1917, the total property having a value of $7,000,000.

He reserved from the gift a four-acre site on which he proposed to erect at his own expense a new building for the Cloisters. He also offered to carry out at his own expense the landscape features of the proposed park. The total gift was estimated at that time to have a value of $13,000,000.

The site of the new building is the highest point on Manhattan Island, commanding a view of the Palisades and Jersey hills, the lower bay and Long Island Sound. On a clear day the view extends as far as Storm King Mountain up the Hudson. The new building will be accessible both by bus and the Eighth Avenue subway.

Few collections of architectural sculpture from medieval cloisters are more comprehensive than this uptown branch of the Metropolitan, according to Mr. Winlock. The new structure will embody "large sections of the cloisters of St. Michael de Cuxa (twelfth century), of St. Guilhem-de-Désert (twelfth to early thirteenth century), of Bonnefont-en-Comminges (thirteenth-fourteenth century) and of Trie (second half of the fifteenth century)."

Local stone partly