CONSTRUCTION OF NEW WING ON FOGG MUSEUM TO BEGIN

Beginning with the breaking of ground this week, work will be started on the new East wing of the Fogg Art Museum, which is to house the Naumberg Art Collection. This new wing will extend from the south corner of the Museum to Prescott street, and is expected to be completed by the beginning of the next academic year.

The Naumberg Art Collection was given to the Museum in 1930 by the late Mrs. Aaron Naumberg of New York, and includes a rare collection of paintings and other works of art, together with the panelled room which housed the collection in the owner's residence. Rembrandt's famous "Portrait of an Old Man" is among the group, which includes well-known works of Franz Halls, Bartolome Murillo, Lorenzo Di Credi El Greco, and others. The Naumberg gift included the sum of $125,000, which is to be used for the installation and maintenance of the collection.

The entrance to the new wing will be through a passageway leading from the Ross study of the Museum into the room which was the dining room of the Naumberg home. In addition to this room there will be two others, the former living room and a balcony, with a connecting foyer and stairway. In these rooms the paintings and other works of art of the collection will be placed in an informal manner, corresponding to the Fransworth Room in Widener Library. This is in accordance with the terms of the bequest, by which Mrs. Naumberg requested that as little as possible of the usual museum atmosphere be created. The Museum will thus be provided with a quiet restful place where students may study, read, and discuss Art at their leisure. The many details that enter into the construction of an art museum, and particularly one of this sort, will be arranged by the architects, Coolidge, Shepley, Bulfinch and Abbott, and the directors, Dr. A. W. Forbes '95 and Professor P. S. Sachs '00.

Owing to the excavation, the usual night entrance to the Museum Library will be closed; instead, the garden gate to the right of the Museum on Quincy Street may be used