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The Metropolitan Museum plans to present exhibitions and educational programming in the Whitney’s landmark Breuer Bulding at 945 Madison Ave. beginning in 2015. Image courtesy of Wikimedia Commons.

Met plans to occupy Whitney’s Madison Avenue site

Tom Hoepf
Tom Hoepf
The Metropolitan Museum plans to present exhibitions and educational programming in the Whitney’s landmark Breuer Bulding at 945 Madison Ave. beginning in 2015. Image courtesy of Wikimedia Commons.
The Metropolitan Museum plans to present exhibitions and educational programming in the Whitney’s landmark Breuer Bulding at 945 Madison Ave. beginning in 2015. Image courtesy of Wikimedia Commons.

NEW YORK (AP) – New York’s Whitney Museum of American Art plans to give up its Madison Avenue building to the Metropolitan Museum of Art.

But officials at both institutions say that won’t happen until the Whitney moves into its new home in downtown Manhattan in 2015. The museums announced the news May 11.

The Whitney has occupied the landmark building designed by Marcel Breuer since 1966.

The Whitney’s new $720 million home in Manhattan’s Meatpacking District was designed by Italian architect Renzo Piano.

The stark, stone Madison Avenue structure will offer the Met badly needed space for contemporary art from around the world. The move would bolster a collection critics consider is not the strength of the Fifth Avenue institution that owns artistic creations going back thousands of years.

The museums are calling the move a “collaborative agreement.”

On May 24, the Whitney will break ground on a 200,000-square-foot building, designed by Piano. Located on Gansevoort Street, bordered by the Hudson River and the High Line, the building will provide the Whitney with essential space for its collection, exhibitions, and education and performing arts programs

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ADDITIONAL IMAGE OF NOTE

The Metropolitan Museum plans to present exhibitions and educational programming in the Whitney’s landmark Breuer Bulding at 945 Madison Ave. beginning in 2015. Image courtesy of Wikimedia Commons.
The Metropolitan Museum plans to present exhibitions and educational programming in the Whitney’s landmark Breuer Bulding at 945 Madison Ave. beginning in 2015. Image courtesy of Wikimedia Commons.