MMA acquires Gilman photo collection

The Metropolitan Museum of Art said yesterday that it had acquired the Gilman Paper Company Collection of photographs, an archive that includes hundreds of works from the medium's earliest years and that is widely considered to be the most important private photography collection in the world.

The more than 8,500 photographs, some purchased by the Met and some donated by the foundation that owns them, will greatly strengthen the museum's photography holdings and make it, along with the J. Paul Getty Museum in Los Angeles, one of the world's pre-eminent institutions for 19th-century photographs. . .

Hans Kraus, a Manhattan photography dealer, said the collection's value on the open market could exceed $100 million. "In terms of its importance and breadth, it is unparalleled as a private collection," he said.

The collection was built by Howard Gilman, a paper magnate, beginning in the late 1970's. It has had a long association with the Met, which often added to its own photography collection in consultation with the Gilman collection's curator, Pierre Apraxine.

Posted by David on March 17, 2005 10:02 PM