Milwaukee Art Museum, Carnegie Museum of Art Wager Masterpiece on Super Bowl XLV

Art Museums Up the Ante on the Biggest Game of the Year
Carnegie Museum of Art, Milwaukee Art Museum bet on their team to win

January 27, 2011 – In keeping with the tradition of friendly wagers, Carnegie Museum of Art and the Milwaukee Art Museum are venturing temporary loans of major works of art, based on the outcome of Super Bowl XLV between the Pittsburgh Steelers and Green Bay Packers.

The stakes: A temporary loan of Milwaukee Art Museum’s prized Boating on the Yerres by Gustave Caillebotte, wagered by Director and avid Packer fan Daniel Keegan, and a temporary loan of the Carnegie Museum of Art’s Bathers with Crab, by Pierre-Auguste Renoir, wagered by Lynn Zelevansky, The Henry J. Heinz II Director of Carnegie Museum of Art, and a proud member of the Steelers nation. The winning city will receive a major work on loan, albeit temporarily, from the city that loses the big game. 

“I’m confident that we will be enjoying the Renoir from Carnegie Museum of Art very soon. I look forward to displaying it where the public can enjoy it and be reminded of the superiority of the Green Bay Packers,” said Keegan of the Milwaukee Art Museum.

“In Pittsburgh, we believe trash talk is bad form. We let the excellence of our football team, and our collection, speak for itself. It will be my great pleasure to see the Caillebotte from the Milwaukee Art Museum hang in our galleries,” said Zelevansky, of Carnegie Museum of Art.

Super Bowl XLV will be played Sunday, February 6, at 5:30 p.m. (CST) in Dallas, Texas. Dates of the loan are still being finalized.

ABOUT THE MILWAUKEE ART MUSEUM
The Milwaukee Art Museum’s far-reaching holdings include more than 20,000 works spanning antiquity to the present day. With a history dating back to 1888, the Museum houses a collection with strengths in 19th- and 20th-century American and European art, contemporary art, American decorative arts, and folk and self-taught art. The Museum includes the Santiago Calatrava-designed Quadracci Pavilion, named by Time magazine as “Best Design of 2001.” For more information, please visit www.mam.org.

ABOUT CARNEGIE MUSEUM OF ART
Located at 4400 Forbes Avenue in the Oakland section of Pittsburgh, Carnegie Museum of Art was founded by industrialist and philanthropist Andrew Carnegie in 1895. One of the four Carnegie Museums of Pittsburgh, it is nationally and internationally recognized for its distinguished collection of American and European works from the 16th century to the present. The Heinz Architectural Center, part of Carnegie Museum of Art, is dedicated to enhancing understanding of the physical environment through its exhibitions, collections, and public programs. For more information, please visit www.cmoa.org.

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