Boston Museum of Fine Arts

Boston’s Museum of Fine Arts -- a storehouse of art treasures on Huntington Avenue since 1909 -- is getting bigger and more inclusive.

A new, $500,000 Art of the America’s wing, with space for some 5,000 additional pieces, is set to open to the public November 20.

The new space comes with a sweeping glass-covered courtyard and arrives after 10 years of planning, fund-raising and construction.

The modernist expansion of the old Beaux Arts granite museum will provide 53 new galleries and more than doubles the number of American-collection items that may be seen. 

”A new heart for the MFA encapsulated in glass,” is the way MFA Director Malcolm Rogers describes the new wing.

More than a million people visit the MFA each year. The new wing will show more than 5,000 works produced in North, Central, and South America over three millennia. It runs from ancient American, Native American, 17th century and maritime art to 18th- through 20th-century art.

The first of the new galleries is devoted to minutely detailed ship models, including USS Constitution, known as Old Ironsides. The real frigate is staffed by U.S. Navy sailors in 1812 uniforms and is based n Charlestown, in the shadow of the Bunker Hill monument.

Old Ironsides and other 18th- and early 19th-century warships and merchant vessels in the collection are exact miniaturized replicas, with masts, sails, furniture, cargo and weapons.

Special events marking the new wing include a free-admission community day Saturday, November 20. An array of events is planned for members in the week before the opening. 

The new, 121,307-square-foot wing for the Art of the Americas, along Forsyth Way, has a central glass building flanked by two pavilions of glass and granite.

The expansion and renovation will increase the building’s total square footage by 28%, providing space for collections, special exhibitions, and educational programs. The design includes more than 1,000 exterior holly bushes and 50 new trees and was inspired by Frederick Law Olmsted’s nearby Back Bay Fens, part of his famed Emerald Necklace.

HelloMetro Tip: The Huntington Avenue and Fenway entrances are fully handicap-accessible.  Free manual wheelchairs are available on a first-come basis at each museum entrance. Aides assisting visitors who use wheelchairs are admitted free. The Courtyard Café and courtyard are wheelchair accessible.

- by Dan Sheridan, Boston Reporter for HelloMetro  (Click to leave a message)

Dan Sheridan

Dan Sheridan is an editor, reporter and media specialist with a background in newspapers, magazines and publishing. He has reported from Tokyo, Singapore and Bangkok and wrote Access Boston, the popular guidebook, from 2002 to 2008.