Inside the NEU

The Yaseen Lectures on the Fine Arts bring acclaimed scholars and artists to the Neuberger Museum of Art and Purchase College, SUNY to discuss their work and address contemporary ideas and issues. Since the lecture series began in 1974, prominent authors, artists, scientists, poets, composers, performance artists, activists, historians, critics, and scholars have discussed themes as distinctive as the speakers themselves. The topics are always pertinent to the moment.

The lectures are endowed by a gift from the late Helen and Leonard Yaseen, art collectors from Larchmont, New York, who were invested in modern and contemporary art scholarship. The Yaseens were inaugural members of the Friends of the Neuberger Museum of Art Board of Directors; they financed a similar lecture series at the Metropolitan Museum of Art.

The legacy of the Yaseens’s gift and its impact on our community continues today through the support of Roger Yaseen and his family in honor of his parents. The Yaseen Lectures on the Fine Arts Fund is stewarded by the New York Community Trust.

With its 20 foot tall walls, the total volume of the Theater Gallery is over 98,000 ft.³.

The Museum Service Council, our cohort of Volunteer Museum Educators, tours around 2,200 visitors to the Neuberger Museum of Art each year. They are the reason our Adult Tours, NEU Kids Program, and School Field Trips happen and one of the reasons children get exceptional and unique art educational experiences that they would not otherwise have access to. They have been providing an invaluable resource to our community for 50 years and it is a true honor to be a part of honoring Lois for the Neuberger’s 50th anniversary.

The wide and open flight of stairs that connects the Museum’s ground floor to the second-floor gallery is a signature feature viewable virtually upon entering the building.

Milton Avery’s Sunday Riders was the very first object to be accessioned into the collection of the Neuberger Museum of Art. 

In the 1930s, at a time when most young men had put their lives on hold until they could straighten out their finances, Roy R. Neuberger married, had his first child, and made his first art acquisitions.

Charles Albert Ginnever (August 28, 1931 – June 16, 2019) was an American sculptor best known for his unique, perspective-warping abstract metal installations. 

A special Inside the NEU–LIVE! event on Friday, May 15, 2020 featured a virtual Coffee Chat about the artist Agnes Denes, a primary figure among concept-based artists who emerged in the 1960s and 1970s.

Sit in on the conversation as Patrice Giasson, the Neuberger Museum’s Alex Gordon Curator of Art of the Americas, discusses Destination Latin America, a five-part exhibition that takes a journey through twentieth- and twenty-first-century modern and contemporary Latin American art from the museum’s collection.

In this session of Inside the NEU, listen in as Museum Director Tracy Fitzpatrick speaks with Museum Archivist Samantha “Sam” Bogner. Learn what an archivist is and does and the work that Sam is currently undertaking at the NEU. Hear her describe the tidbits and stories that she is uncovering as she makes her way through historical materials dating back to 1972 and learn how these discoveries can foster connections among the Neuberger and other organizations and institutions around the globe.

In this session of Inside the NEU, sit in on the conversation as Museum Director Tracy Fitzpatrick and Associate Preparator Jose Smith ’94 discuss how the museum’s “prep team” plans, builds, and assists in creating the special moments that patrons have as they experience the works on view. 

In this session of Inside the NEU, sit in on the conversation as Museum Director Tracy Fitzpatrick and Director of Development Christine Downes discuss how financial gifts and other types of philanthropic support can change lives.

Hear Chris describe what excites her about connecting donors with their personal philanthropic interests – including a story about her own work with an educational organization in South Africa – and how charitable donations make visions a reality at the Museum.

In this session of Inside the NEU, sit in on the conversation as Museum Director Tracy Fitzpatrick and Head of Museum Preparedness Sanjeev Avasthi discuss memorable moments during Sanjeev’s 25-year career at the NEU and how his training in Fine Arts has made his current responsibilities so meaningful.

Recognized by many visitors as one of the first NEU team members to welcome guests to the museum, learn more about Sanjeev’s role in keeping the museum’s art, staff, and guests safe.

In this session of Inside the NEU, sit in on the conversation as Museum Director Tracy Fitzpatrick speaks with Purchase College Alumnae and Museum Registrar Pat Magnani ’85 about the role of a registrar … find out who registrars are, the role they play, and what they do every day to protect the art that has been entrusted to them. 

Sit in on the conversation as Tracy Fitzpatrick, Director of the Neuberger Museum of Art, reminisces with retiring Chief Curator Helaine Posner about their work together at the museum.

“Art that pushes boundaries and raises important questions.”

During this session of Inside the NEU, Alex Gordon Curator of Art of the Americas Dr. Patrice Giasson and Engels the Artist revisit the Neuberger Museum’s Fall 2019 exhibition “Art Got Into Me”: The Work of Engels the Artist. 

This edition of Inside the NEU explores the life and work of British artist Henry Moore (30 July 1898 – 31 August 1986).  Best known for his semi-abstract monumental bronze sculptures, Moore’s creations can be found as public works of art around the world.  One of the four casts of his Large Two Forms series is included in the Neuberger Museum of Art’s collection; the sculpture is located at the entrance to the Purchase College campus.

This week the Neuberger Museum of Art looks back to A Studio in the Gallery: The Playful Universe of Ignacio Iturria, a Fall 2017 retrospective of one of Uruguay’s most accomplished artists.

This edition of Inside the NEU explores the life and work of contemporary abstract artist José Parlá whose first solo museum exhibition in New York City, José Parlá: It’s Yours, is currently on view at the Bronx Museum of the Arts through January 10, 2021.

In May 2019, Lee Krasner: Living Color made its debut at the Barbican Centre in London. After stops in Frankfurt, Germany, and Bern, Switzerland, the exhibition – including the Neuberger Museum of Art’s own Burning Candles (1955) – has made its final stop at the Guggenheim Bilbao where it will be on view through January 10, 2021.

In this edition of NEU To Do, learn more about Lee Krasner, her pioneering work in Abstract Expressionism, and the Living Color exhibition.

During this Inside the NEU-LIVE! presentation on Wednesday, May 20th, Neuberger Museum of Art Chief Curator Helaine Posner introduced contemporary artist Lesley Dill’s work before live streaming We Are Animals of Language, a documentary by Ed Robbins (Pounding Glass Productions) that chronicles the making of Rush and other works on view in the Neuberger’s 2007 exhibition, Lesley Dill: Tremendous World.

This inaugural session of Inside the NEU features Museum director Tracy Fitzpatrick and provenance researcher Beth Silver discussing works in the museum’s permanent collection by the great American modernist Milton Avery. Listen as Tracy and Beth share the personal stories they’ve uncovered about Roy R. Neuberger’s interest in collecting this artist’s works.

This virtual edition of Art Sandwiched-In: A Virtual Curator-led Exhibition Tour of the Pier Paolo Pasolini: Subversive Prophet exhibition was held “live” on Friday, June 5, 2020.

The Neuberger Museum of Art is an academic museum, meaning that while we function as a public-facing exhibiting and collecting institution, we are on the Purchase College, SUNY campus. That placement, both physically and conceptually, is a fundamental part of the museum’s identity.

In this session of Inside the NEU, listen in as Associate Curator of Education for Academic Programs Kristen Lindberg discusses the museum’s role as a center of teaching and learning for the Purchase College community.