Paul Mellon Centenary

2007 marks the centenary of the birth of the Centre’s benefactor Paul Mellon and it is being marked by a series of exhibitions focussing on his life as a collector and philanthropist. On 17th April the Yale Center for British Art opened the exhibition Paul Mellon’s Legacy: A Passion for British Art (until 29 July) which will transfer to open at the Royal Academy of Arts in London on 20th October. At the Fitzwilliam Museum, Cambridge Paul Mellon: A Cambridge Tribute will open on Paul Mellon’s birthday (11th June) and a few weeks later (on 11th July) the Virginia Museum of Fine Arts in Richmond, Virginia will open the exhibition Great British Watercolors from the Paul Mellon Collection at the Yale Center for British Art (until 30th September) which will transfer to the State Hermitage Museum in St Petersburg, Russia for an opening on 23rd October. Many other institutions such as the National Gallery of Art in Washington, D.C. are organising events to mark Mr Mellon’s centenary.