“This audacious initiative to redesign the Princeton University Art Museum and extend its effect on campus and beyond has been made possible partly by Preston Haskell’s vision and generosity,” stated President Christopher L. Eisgruber ’83. “With his magnificent gifts, Preston is adding a significant piece to the Art Museum’s collections and creating a lively environment for their exploration and study. Preston’s remarkable contribution to the Art Museum and his dedication over many years to the humanities and arts at Princeton are both greatly appreciated.”
The new Princeton University Art Museum, built on the old museum’s site and located in the center of the Princeton campus, has been made possible by several significant alumni contributions. This roughly doubles the amount of space available for displaying, conserving, studying, and interpreting the Art Museum’s collections. Over 114,000 works of art from civilizations worldwide are part of the museum’s vast collection, yet only 2% of them could ever be on show in the former structure.
The new Princeton University Art Museum will have three stories and nine primary interlocked pavilions that house many of the building’s new galleries. Sir David Adjaye of Adjaye Associates and executive architects Cooper Robertson designed it. Numerous social gathering areas will position the facility as a new “town square” for the campus and community. In contrast, six new object-study classrooms will support the academic needs of students and faculty. The facility’s expansive galleries, most of which are located on a single level, will enable new inquiries. The Art Museum’s building work, which started in the summer of 2021, is anticipated to be finished by the end of 2024. Over the coming year, the museum will receive additional significant gifts.
Haskell is a passionate art collector whose main passions include mid-to late-20th-century abstract expressionism, minimalism, and pop art, particularly from the 1940s through the 1970s. He was named one of the top 100 collectors in the US by Art & Antiques magazine in 2003. For significant exhibitions at the Cummer Museum of Art & Gardens in Jacksonville, the Museum of Contemporary Art Jacksonville, Jacksonville University, the North Carolina Museum of Art, the Birmingham Museum of Art, the Gibbes Museum of Art in Charleston, and the Tampa Museum of Art, he has over the years loaned pieces from his collection. Additionally, he collaborated on three shows with the Princeton University Art Museum, including “Rothko to Richter: Mark-Making in Abstract Painting from the Collection of Preston H. Haskell” in 2014.
Haskell spent 24 years on the advisory council for the Princeton University Art Museum, including four years as its chair (2010-14). He continues to be an honorary member. He established the Haskell Curatorship of Modern and Contemporary Art at the Art Museum in 2010, held by Mitra Abbaspour at the moment.
“My life has been dramatically influenced by Princeton University,” stated Haskell. “Through a wonderful undergraduate experience, a lifetime of personal affiliations and friendships, service and gifts to the University, and the fun that has come to me through its varied resources, numerous constituencies, and exciting events, it has enriched and bettered me.”
One of the oldest art collections in North America, the Princeton University Art Museum collections date back to the 1750s, when the first pieces of art were added to the collection of what was then the College of New Jersey. The university said in 2018 that Adjaye and Cooper Robertson would be working on the new structure’s design. On the location of the former museum, a new structure will be erected that will also house the university’s department of art and archaeology while keeping Marquand Library. The three units will continue to work as a dynamic research and teaching hub almost without peers in higher education.
The University’s strategic framework is supported by the Venture Forward campaign, which was introduced in October 2021. Its engagement and fundraising efforts are coordinated with the plan’s primary focus areas, which include financial aid, data science, bioengineering, the environment, the humanities, and other crucial fields of study that reflect Princeton’s dedication to the liberal arts.