Largest gift ever to Harvard Art Museum

Yes, that is just what Harvard needs another $45 million dollar gift. This is a school that have a $10 Billion Dollar building program and growing.

I love how the wealthy are so proud of themselves for giving things away. Maybe if you sold the work and then invested the money in a business you could employee people in the state. Works out to be about 90 decent paying jobs. Harvard should be ashamed of its investing practices, lack of community commitment, and affimative action/racism. Why don't we educate wealthy foreign nationals so they can have a good pedigree to exploit the masses back home. The Ivory tower rhetoric holds no water. Hopefully the working class soldiers will come back from the oil wars and invade the true enemies of the state.

While some people inexplicably are sour about a donation that will expand a museum open to all (and free for all who live in Cambridge) I am excited about the idea of Harvard's donors giving to a public part of the university. The museums are one of the great things Harvard does for the rest of us who live in metro boston who don't work or study there. Now if another Harvard donor could give money to expand the natural history museum......

Oh, please! Except for letting George Bush buy his way into the B School, Harvard does a lot towards the leadership of this country and toward improving the economy of Cambridge. You need us more than we need you.

jeez guys, did you accidentally mail all of your food stamps already this month? excuse us for being charitable

While I may agree with the sentiments posted (1&2) I do not agree with the spelling or grammar...LOL

Harvard=Arrogance

So we have homeless people on the streets of the city, while others are having a hard time paying mortgages and we still have vapid idiots like this giving money to art museums? Just what we need…more black-tie fundraisers for the Opera houses and the MFA where checkbooks fly open and rich people try to impress each other. If you’d really like to focus on the “enrichment of…life” there are thousands of better places to give your money.

How about a little gratitude? These places are open to the public and are host to many thousands of visitors each year. I'm sorry if it offends people that Harvard has managed to create an institution that has brought inspiration to so many and has had such a meaningful day-to-day impact on this donor's life over the past half a century. The works of art are tasteful and irreplaceable. It sounds as if the museums need the cash to make the facilities even more accessible to the public. This is a charitable act that should be celebrated. For all we know, the next Picasso or Modigliani is a five year old kid in Cambridge. I hope so.

You should post the donated big-name artwork on this website, instead of the picture of the front of art museum.

Wow. Way to choose a needy recipient. They were hurting.

Oddly enough. the Art Museums at Harvard have been the culprits of mismanaging their own funds for many, many years. To donate more money to these ends will result in more layoffs, more millions spent in projects that are never completed and an even higher rate of dissatisfaction for employees and the visiting public. Never known for displaying insight into assembling a racially diverse collection, these contributions further the perception that the Art Museums are clearly out of touch with what is actually studied in the art world. Already passe as a museum, someone has donated more cement for the burial.

Actually, the museums were a nice place to visit. And on Saturday mornings, free to all. Art tends to broaden minds. Perhaps commentator #2 should check them out when they reopen. Too bad we have to wait so long.

As much as I love the arts myself and can appreciate what Harvard graduates have contributed to the world, this donation does defy comprehension. Why 45 million? There must be other worthy causes that could've benefited much more people than the elite few who visit the Harvard museums.

If a survey on the ratio of Harvard students, Democrats vs Republicans were taken. At Harvard you would find the wealthy, rich Democrat prevailing.
The rich do keep getting richer,don't they. So much for giving to the greater good, and people in need. Hypocrisy at its best, since Democrats engender that only their party cares for the poor and cast off, when in reality their agenda has a singular special interest, and that is, making sure anything is defined as marriage.
I'm glad we look at the content of what a politician has to offer his/her community, and look at the history of how they have worked to achieve that value, to decide on our vote, rather than empty, mindless party line rhetoric.

...on the other hand, it is a good thing to have the works of such masters brought out of private collections and to a place where the public can appreciate them. Pulitzer could have sold them to some CEOs or hedge fund investors, who would "display" them in their Manhattan apartments, to be seen, at most, by a few peers at dinner parties, and perhaps, the housekeeping staff. Those masterpieces and others like it should be cared for so they can be viewed by many, for a long time. And, that requires good stewardship and a good budget.

This is a wonderful gift. Rather than having those works hanging in a private residence where a very select few would ever be able to enjoy and learn from them, they're now where they belong, in a museum setting where they can be viewed by all comers. To sell this art to a private collector would merely ensure they'd stay out of the public eye. That they were gifted to an institution which has the resources to care for and to display them only makes sense.

what Harvard gave me was/is a way to learn, to appreciate things and processes completely outside of any political or economic context, and a life-long addiction to learning, acceptance of diversity, and curiosity. they don't really need more money, endowments, whatever, but i'd rather the university have the ability to move freely in any direction that needs help, than count on either the present political structure, or economic structure to move the planet forward. free speech and research, freely undertaken, then provided to the world is the key to the future.

bh H '73

I've been to the museum and it definately needed updating.
If you're going to try to preserve something then do it; otherwise it will be lost to the world forever and that my dears, would be a shame.