The Huntington Art Collections

Lois and Robert F. Erburu Gallery

The Lois and Robert F. Erburu Gallery at The Huntington sets the stage for a major development in the displays of the Art Collections.

The 16,000-square-foot structure, ultimately built to house the expanding collection of American art, opened to the public in 2005 with an inaugural installation of the distinguished collection of European art from the late 16th century to about 1900. It includes 18th-century full-length British portraits by Reynolds, Gainsborough and Lawrence as well as key elements of the British sculpture and French art collections. This display will remain on view as the Huntington Gallery - former residence of Henry and Arabella Huntington - is closed for repairs and renovation.

Upon completion of the Huntington Gallery renovation, the European Collection will return to the main house, its home for the last 90 years. The Erburu Gallery will then fulfill its ultimate purpose as showplace for the institution's growing collection of American art.

Los Angeles architect Frederick Fisher, of the architectural firm Frederick Fisher and Partners in Santa Monica, created a modern classical building adjoining the Virginia Steele Scott Gallery of American Art on the southern edge of the Dorothy Collins Brown Garden. The new gallery is flanked on the west by the MaryLou and George Boone Gallery, where changing exhibitions are displayed, and by the Botanical Center to the north.

In addition to taking architectural cues from the surrounding buildings at The Huntington, Fred Fisher looked to examples of art gallery design from early 19th-century Europe, such as John Soane's Dulwich Picture Gallery in London, and to more modern American and European examples such as the Louisiana Museum of Modern Art in Humlebaek, Denmark. Famous for its connection to nature, the latter inspired the idea of a glass-fronted loggia that would communicate with the gardens outside, rather than closing them from view. The visitor sees art on one side, nature on the other, and the glass loggia sweeps along the front of the addition, linking the new building to the existing Scott Gallery, designed in 1984 by Paul Gray.

The gallery adds 8,000 square feet of exhibition space and 8,000 square feet of storage area to the original building. While the storage space will initially hold objects displaced by the restoration of the Huntington mansion, it was designed with the goal of long-term expansion and will allow for conversion into additional gallery space to accommodate continued growth of the American collection.

The building's interior features four square and three rectangular galleries with an octagonal room at its center. The elegantly outlined, cleanly detailed, and contemplative spaces will be lit with a combination of natural and incandescent light.

In relation to neighboring structures, from the exterior, the Erburu Gallery makes a welcoming and respectful statement, while inside, the building opens up as a series of magnificent spaces of great scale and power.

The Huntington's collection of American art has grown impressively over the past 20 years, evolving to include American paintings, sculpture and decorative arts from the late 17th through the mid 20th centuries that have gradually taken over every available space in the Scott Gallery. The collection includes works by John Singleton Copley, Mary Cassatt, John Singer Sargent, Edward Hopper, and Robert Motherwell, as well as sculpture, decorative arts, prints, drawings, and photographs. It also includes a permanent installation of works by the early 20th-century Southern California architects, Charles and Henry Greene, as well as other Arts and Crafts objects.

Capital funding for the $6-million building was made possible by the Virginia Steele Scott Foundation, Anne and Jim Rothenberg, the Ahmanson Foundation, the Weingart Foundation, the Fletcher Jones Foundation, the H.N. and Frances C. Berger Foundation, the Ralph M. Parsons Foundation, and Heather and Paul Haaga. Endowment support was provided by Bradford M. Mishler. The Lois and Robert F. Erburu Gallery is named in honor of the Huntington trustee emeritus and his wife for their many years of dedicated leadership.

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