After shutting down for a two-year expansion project, the Muscarelle Museum of Art is making its return in a big way.

The William & Mary museum will celebrate its reopening on Saturday with a brand new expanded museum, combining modern design with historical traditions. Described as a “state-of-the-art regional venue,” the 42,000-square-foot expansion triples the size of the original museum to around 60,000 square feet, creating the Martha Wren Briggs Center for the Visual Arts.

The opening event, from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m., will feature guided tours of the new building, gallery tours of the museum’s permanent collection and the special exhibition “William & Mary Collects III,” which showcases artwork from alumni and university community members. The event will also have art activities as well as Steve Prince, Muscarelle’s distinguished artist in residence and director of engagement, leading a large scale steamroller printmaking activity by William & Mary, Old Dominion University and East Carolina University students.

Julie Tucker, the Muscarelle’s marketing and events manager, said she is incredibly excited about the museum’s return, noting that prior visitors will not recognize the new space.

“It’s been so long awaited by everyone in the community, but particularly by our staff,” Tucker said.

One of the oldest university-based art collections in the country, the museum has amassed almost 8,000 works since its establishment in 1983, Tucker said. The museum will now have 14 galleries, including new event and educational spaces for William & Mary students attending classes and for the community.

First chartered by William & Mary’s Board of Visitors in the early 1980s, the Muscarelle Museum’s mission was to serve as a teaching museum and resource for the college while also serving the Peninsula due to a prior lack of art museums between Richmond and Norfolk, said museum Director David Brashear.

While noting Muscarelle’s successful track record over the years, Brashear said that as a facility, it didn’t have all the capabilities needed to be a fully functional museum, having five galleries previously.

“We didn’t really have a great gathering space. We didn’t have any great spaces where we could do programs where we taught, where we had special lectures,” Brashear said.

Around 2013-2014, the museum received the green light from administrators to think seriously about expanding the museum, which led to 10 years of work bringing the new expansion into reality. The center itself is also named after lead donor Martha Wren Briggs, a William & Mary alumna who wanted her university gift to help provide educational spaces for the museum, giving non-art major students an opportunity to experience the visual arts, Brashear said.

“Her perspective was, ‘We can all enhance our lives by at least opening a small window and letting the art infuse our lives,’” Brashear said. “She loved the museum; she lived right across the street from the museum. She visited us when she was well and she left us the lead gift that makes all of this possible.”

On the heels of its reopening, the museum will soon house an exclusive exhibit with “Michelangelo: The Genesis of the Sistine.” On view from March 6 through May 28, the exhibit opens on the artist’s 550th birthday and debuts seven drawings, presented for the first time in the United States. The exhibit will have 25 drawings for the Sistine Chapel ceiling as well as “The Last Judgement” with lithographs, engravings and much more showcased. With Michelangelo destroying many of his sketches, intended for his eyes only, fewer than 50 survive today of the hundreds he made for the Sistine Chapel ceiling — with half of those drawings coming to the Muscarelle.

“This is a gathering that doesn’t often happen of these drawings, and seven of those works haven’t been to the United States before,” Brashear said.

Curated by Adriano Marinazzo, Michelangelo expert and Muscarelle special projects curator, the exhibit aims to offer a glimpse of mind of Michelangelo, presenting the thoughts, struggles and breakthroughs that helped form one of history’s greatest masterpieces. Calling Marinazzo “incredibly passionate” about the exhibit, Brashear commended his work in compiling the appropriate drawings. Noting the fragility of the 500-year-old renaissance works, Brashear said they are only allowed to be out for display “for 12 weeks about every five years.”

“They’re incredibly fragile, and works on paper is subject to damage from light,” Brashear said.

With the exhibit being Muscarelle’s first big show, Brashear said there’s already a “tremendous amount of excitement” and anticipates the exhibition making waves in the art scene, translating into a lot of visitation.

For more information on the Muscarelle Museum and the “Michelangelo: The Genesis of the Sistine” exhibit, visit muscarelle.wm.edu/events. The museum is located at 603 Jamestown Road at William & Mary.

James W. Robinson, 757-799-0621, [email protected]

Originally Published: February 5, 2025 at 1:00 PM EST