The Morgan Library & Museum

To mark the 2024 centennial of its life as a public institution, the Morgan Library & Museum presents a major exhibition devoted to the life and career of its inaugural director, Belle da Costa Greene. Widely recognized as an authority on illuminated manuscripts and deeply respected as a cultural heritage executive, Greene was one of the most prominent librarians in American history. She was the daughter of Genevieve Ida Fleet Greener (1849–1941) and Richard T. Greener (1844–1922), the first Black graduate of Harvard College, and was at birth known by a different name: Belle Marion Greener. After her parents separated in the 1890s, her mother changed the family surname to Greene, Belle and her brother adopted variations of the middle name da Costa, and the family began to pass as white in a racist and segregated America. Greene is well known for the instrumental role she played in building the exceptional collection of rare books and manuscripts formed by American financier J. Pierpont Morgan, who hired her as his personal librarian in 1905. After Morgan's death in 1913, Greene continued as the librarian of his son and heir, J.P. Morgan Jr., who would transform his father's Library into a public institution in 1924. But her career as director of what was then known as the Pierpont Morgan Library―a leadership role she held for twenty-four years―is less well understood, as are aspects of her education, private collecting, and dense social and professional networks. The exhibition traces Greene’s storied life, from her roots in a predominantly Black community in Washington, D.C., to her distinguished career at the helm of one of the world’s great research libraries. Through extraordinary objects―from medieval manuscripts and rare printed books to archival records and portraits―the exhibition demonstrates the confidence and savvy Greene brought to her roles as librarian, scholar, curator, and cultural executive, and honor her enduring legacy. This exhibition is on view from October 25, 2024 through May 4, 2025.

A conversation with Maria Popova and Caldecott-winning children’s book artist and author Sophie Blackall, lensed through Antoine de Saint- Exupéry's original watercolors for The Little Prince and Lewis Carroll’s diary entry from the day he first told the story of Wonderland to the real-life Alice. "To celebrate the centennial of the Morgan Library & Museum–one of my favorite cultural institutions, stewarding some of the most influential works in the history of creative culture–I have chosen several items from the collection that I especially love to serve as springboards for larger conversations about art and life with some of the most interesting and creative people I know. We will be investigating questions like the nature of time and self, the art of observation and the art of vision, the relationship between memory and self-forgetfulness in creative work, and the power of being an outsider, lensed through Whitman and Dickinson, The Little Prince and Alice in Wonderland, the invisible women in the margins of classical music and the hidden philosophy in the margins of children's books." – Maria Popova, writer, thinker, and creator of The Marginalian Sophie Blackall, AM is an award-winning illustrator of over 50 books for children, including the New York Times best-selling Ivy and Bean series, the 2016 Caldecott Medal winner, Finding Winnie, and the 2019 Caldecott Medal winner, Hello Lighthouse, which she also wrote. She is the five-time recipient of The New York Times Best Illustrated Picture Book Award and has worked with UNICEF and Save the Children, UK on global health and literacy initiatives. Originally from Australia, she now splits her time between Brooklyn, New York, and the Catskill Mountains, where she and her husband run a retreat for the children's book community called Milkwood Farm. Maria Popova thinks and writes about our search for meaning—sometimes through science and philosophy, sometimes through poetry and children's books, always through the lens of wonder. She is the creator of The Marginalian (born in 2006 under the name Brain Pickings), which is included in the Library of Congress permanent digital archive of culturally valuable materials, author of Figuring, and maker of the live show The Universe in Verse—a charitable celebration of the wonder of reality through stories of science winged with poetry — which is now also a book. Held Tuesday, November 12, 2024.

The incredible life of Belle da Costa Greene has been told in several biographies and scholarly articles. But her captivating narrative has also inspired creative works of historical fiction, plays, and music. This program will highlight three of the most significant adaptations of Belle Greene’s life: Marie Benedict and Victoria Christopher Murray’s novel The Personal Librarian (2021), Juliane Hiam’s play Revels and Revelations (2010), and Epiphany “Big Piph” Morrow’s hip-hop track “The Ballad of Belle da Costa Greene” (2018). Join the creators for a lively program featuring the back-stories of these works, as well as discussion and performance. Held Friday, November 15, 2024.

The Morgan Drawing Institute is pleased to present a symposium held in conjunction with Far and Away: Drawings from the Clement C. Moore Collection on view June 28 through September 22, 2024. Moore’s promised gift to the Morgan further expands upon the rich collection of Dutch drawings, illuminating their various functions and techniques and their relationship to European artistic traditions spanning from the seventeenth to early twentieth century. The symposium expands upon these themes, with the following presentations: Julia Siemon, Director of Exhibitions and Chief Curator, Bard Graduate Center, New York All'Insegna d'Anversa: Stradanus and his Netherlandish Network Abroad Rob Fucci, Lecturer in the History of Art, University of Amsterdam Real and Imagined Pasts: Drawings of Ruins in the Early Dutch Republic Leonore van Sloten, Senior Curator, Rembrandthuis Museum, Amsterdam All the World's a Stage: Theater and its Impact on Rembrandt Stijn Alsteens, Director, Fondation Custodia-Collection Frits Lugt, Paris Poetry and Truth in Lambert Doomer’s French Views Gregory Rubinstein, Head of Old Master and Early British Drawings, Sotheby’s, London Albion Seen through Orange-Tinted Spectacles: Drawings of Seventeenth-century Britain by Artists from the Low Countries John Marciari, Director of Curatorial Affairs and Head of the Department of Drawings, Morgan Library & Museum; Jane Shoaf Turner, Editor, Master Drawings; and Clement C. ("Chips") Moore A Conversation on Collecting

The Morgan Drawing Institute is pleased to present a symposium held in conjunction with Far and Away: Drawings from the Clement C. Moore Collection on view June 28 through September 22, 2024. Moore’s promised gift to the Morgan further expands upon the rich collection of Dutch drawings, illuminating their various functions and techniques and their relationship to European artistic traditions spanning from the seventeenth to early twentieth century. The symposium expands upon these themes, with the following presentations: Julia Siemon, Director of Exhibitions and Chief Curator, Bard Graduate Center, New York All'Insegna d'Anversa: Stradanus and his Netherlandish Network Abroad Rob Fucci, Lecturer in the History of Art, University of Amsterdam Real and Imagined Pasts: Drawings of Ruins in the Early Dutch Republic Leonore van Sloten, Senior Curator, Rembrandthuis Museum, Amsterdam All the World's a Stage: Theater and its Impact on Rembrandt Stijn Alsteens, Director, Fondation Custodia-Collection Frits Lugt, Paris Poetry and Truth in Lambert Doomer’s French Views Gregory Rubinstein, Head of Old Master and Early British Drawings, Sotheby’s, London Albion Seen through Orange-Tinted Spectacles: Drawings of Seventeenth-century Britain by Artists from the Low Countries John Marciari, Director of Curatorial Affairs and Head of the Department of Drawings, Morgan Library & Museum; Jane Shoaf Turner, Editor, Master Drawings; and Clement C. ("Chips") Moore A Conversation on Collecting

Complementing the opening of the exhibition Belle da Costa Greene: A Librarian’s Legacy, this one-day scholarly symposium will bring together experts working on Belle Greene and/or the fields relevant to our understanding of her life and career, including African American history and literature, the history of museums and libraries, Medieval studies, art history, feminist bibliography, and book history. As Belle Greene herself wrote in 1937, in one of her five-year reports on the Morgan’s activities, “Increased usefulness of the Library to the general public has been fostered through more frequent lectures and addresses by eminent authorities.” This symposium aims to bring together yet another group of “eminent authorities” in four panels/roundtables, following the great tradition of the lecture and conference series that Greene herself inaugurated at the Morgan so many years ago. Schedule Historical and Literary Perspectives on Racial Passing (9:15–10:45 AM) Dr. Sterling L. Bland, Rutgers University-Newark Dr. Julia Charles-Linen, Arizona State University Dr. Dominique Jean-Louis, Center for Brooklyn History Belle da Costa Greene and the History of Black Librarianship (11 AM–12:30 PM) Tamar Evangelestia-Dougherty, Smithsonian Libraries and Archives Rhonda Evans, LuEsther T. Mertz Library, New York Botanical Garden Petrina Jackson, Arthur & Elizabeth Schlesinger Library, Harvard University DeLisa Minor Harris, Fisk University New Directions in the Study of Belle da Costa Greene (2:15–3:45 PM) Dr. Heidi Ardizzone, author of An Illuminated Life: Belle da Costa Greene's Journey from Prejudice to Privilege Erica Ciallela, Exhibition Project Coordinator - Belle da Costa Greene, Morgan Library & Museum Dr. Anne-Marie Eze, Houghton Library, Harvard University Dr. Philip S. Palmer, Robert H. Taylor Curator and Department Head, Literary and Historical Manuscripts, Morgan Library & Museum Jean Strouse, author of Morgan: American Financier The Afterlives of Belle da Costa Greene (4–5:30 PM) Dr. Sierra Lomuto, Rowan University Dr. Kate Ozment, California State Polytechnic University-Pomona Dr. Tracy Sharpley-Whiting, Vanderbilt University