Curatorial Blog

What happens to a work of art when it is rejected by its patron? Explore an interactive map to discover how the canvases in Jean-Honoré Fragonard’s Progress of Love series were scorned by a royal mistress, rolled up for twenty years in the Louvre, and more than tripled in number on their way from eighteenth-century France to the fourth floor of Frick Madison.

Christopher Snow Hopkins, Associate Editor, examines the appearance of the Frick’s King Philip IV of Spain by Diego Velázquez in the classic film The Maltese Falcon—a tantalizing cameo that has not been commented upon before.

Learn more about our highly acclaimed exhibition Barkley L. Hendricks: Portraits at the Frick with an excerpt from Curator Aimee Ng’s introductory essay from the show’s catalogue.

Reprinted from the Winter 2015 issue of the Members’ Magazine, this article details a significant gift to the Frick’s permanent collection, Bartolomé Esteban Murillo’s Self-Portrait (ca. 1650–55).

Van Dyck’s portrait of Cardinal Bentivoglio has left Italy, traveling to the U.S. for the first time, where it is on view at the Frick in the Van Dyck: The Anatomy of Portraiture (March 2 through June 5, 2016). This great work is discussed by Xavier F. Salomon, who considers it among the most important loans to the exhibition (and his favorite work in the show).

Xavier F. Salomon writes about a painting by Richard Parkes Bonington, currently on view in the North Hall. The loan depicts the coastal environs of northern France and complements the Frick’s exhibition Turner’s Modern and Ancient Ports: Passages through Time.

Xavier F. Salomon, Peter Jay Sharp Chief Curator, writes about a painting believed to be a copy after a lost portrait by Bartolomé Esteban Murillo (and described as such in the catalogue of the current special exhibition), this portrait has very recently been restored and discovered to be the original. It will remain on view through the rest of the New York exhibition.

Alexander J. Noelle, Anne L. Poulet Curatorial Fellow, previews the 2019 exhibition dedicated to the sculptor Bertoldo di Giovanni. He discusses the artist’s statuette, Shield Bearer, which will be featured in the show, and is from the Frick’s permanent collection.

In 1991, Mirabella commissioned John Updike (1932–2009) to write a short article about the Frick. “We would simply like your thoughts as you wander through," wrote Wendy Gimbel, the magazine’s consulting editor. "Obviously, it’s completely up to you.”

Digital tools allow us to visualize the trajectory of an artwork through time and space. Explore an interactive map tracing the meandering path of Johannes Vermeer’s Mistress and Maid (ca. 1666–67) around the globe, from Vermeer’s studio in Delft in the seventeenth century to the second floor of Frick Madison in 2021.