Harvard Art Museums Report: The Origin Story

 Harvard Art Museums' Names + Origins

Zak Kish-DeGiulio

Harvard Art Museums Timeline

Research: Sandro Capo Chichi
Design: Kéla Jackson


Harvard Art Museums 

Mission + Oversight

Kéla Jackson + Sandro Capo Chichi

"The Harvard Art Museums—the Fogg Museum, the Busch-Reisinger Museum, and the Arthur M. Sackler Museum—advance knowledge about and appreciation of art and art museums. The museums are committed to preserving, documenting, presenting, interpreting, and strengthening the collections and resources in their care."


"Through research, teaching, professional training, and public education, the museums strive to advance the understanding and appreciation of art. Programs encourage close looking at original works of art, collaboration with campus and community partners, and the production of new scholarship."


The Harvard Art Museums, originally the Fogg Museum, the Busch-Reisinger Museum, and the Arthur Sackler Museum, demonstrate a portion of Harvard's expansive—geographically and temporally—collecting practices. The Fogg Museum primarily collected Western art including works on paper, painting and sculpture. The Busch-Reisinger Museum held noteworthy works from German-speaking Europe and the Arthur Sackler Museum was dedicated to arts of Asia, the Middle East, and the Mediterranean. Together, the museum collection came to found that of the Harvard Art Museums. The Museums function as a sight for research, teaching, and innovation for Harvard students, faculty, and community. The events and recent acquisitions show a shift in geographical and temporal expanse as the Museums reckon with its future presence in the art world and Cambridge. 

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History of Harvard Art Museums (Timeline)

  1891  Gift given by Mrs. Elizabeth Fogg in memory of her deceased husband to build an art museum in his name.   1895 Opening of the Fogg Museum as a teaching facility for art scholars, curators and museum professionals.    1897  Professors George Bartlett, Kuno Francke, and Hugo K. Schilling publish the pamphlet, “The Need of a Germanic Museum at Harvard.” 1901 November 10—the birthday of Martin Luther and Friedrich Schiller—marks the dedication of the Germanic Museum in Rogers Gymnasium (pictured). Kuno Francke is named curator. At the time of the dedication, the Germanic Museum was the only museum in North America to be dedicated to the arts of Central and Northern Europe.   1910 Adolphus Busch donates $265,000 for the construction of a new building. A design is commissioned from German Bestelmeyer of Dresden, who also built the Reichsschulden-verwaltung building, Berlin (1921–23) and was a proponent of Nazi architecture. 1921 After delays due to W...
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Museum Funds

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  Funding: The Harvard Art Museums are generally supported through various types of gifts, Friends Circle, Fellows, and Corporate Friends. While much of the internal budget and funding resources remain private, there is extensive information available through press releases that indicate major donors and funding circles from with the Museums derive support. The Museum is also supported by the Mass Arts Council quite broadly.    The press releases indicate that there are many extant funding sources within the Harvard University system as well as within the Harvard Art Museums budgets for exhibitions and programming. Exhibitions have been funded by the Provostial Fund in the Arts and Humanities as well as other endowed funds of which Library and Museums received about 4 percent of total endowment spends. The many different sources of funding within the Museums mark the original institutions as some of the funding is still designated to the Fogg, Busch-Reisinger or the Sackl...
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