Jacques Marchais Museum of Tibetan Art

The Jacques Marchais Museum of Tibetan Art is a museum located on residential Lighthouse Hill in Egbertville, Staten Island, New York City. It is home to one of the United States' most extensive collections of Himalayan artifacts.[1] The museum was created by Jacques Marchais, (1887-1948) an American woman, to serve as a bridge between the West and the rich ancient and cultural traditions of Tibet and the Himalayan region.[2] Marchais designed her educational center to be an all-encompassing experience: it was built to resemble a rustic Himalayan monastery with extensive terraced gardens and grounds and a fish and lotus pond.[3] The museum was praised for its authenticity by the Dalai Lama who visited in 1991.[4] In 2009, the site was listed on the New York State Register and National Register of Historic Places. A writer in the New York Times referred to the museum's founder under the name Jacqueline Klauber, noting that she used Marchais as her professional name.[4]

Office table

Jacques Marchais
Museum of Tibetan Art
Established1947
Location338 Lighthouse Ave, Staten Island, New York, United States
WebsiteJacques Marchais Museum of Tibetan Art

Jacques Marchais Coblentz was born in 1887 in Cincinnati, Ohio. After a career as a child actress in Chicago she went to Boston and married at age 16, had three children, and divorced in 1910. After a brief second marriage she moved to New York City, returned to acting, and associated with people who were interested in Eastern religions and Buddhism. About 1920 she married the owner of a chemical factory and they lived in rural Staten Island. There, she began collecting. She opened an art gallery in Manhattan in 1938. In 1945 she opened a research library next to her home in Staten Island.[5]

Marchais had never visited Tibet or the Himalayas, but she had a lifelong interest in the region and sought to find a permanent home for her collection. The museum officially opened in 1947.[6] The museum, its collection and its history in Staten Island has been chronicled in a book by the same name[7] and 60th anniversary exhibition.[8]

The museum has not been able to benefit from the Department of Transportation's initiative to draw traffic to the borough's cultural organizations via a new signage program because it lacks a dedicated parking lot[9] and as such it remains somewhat hidden among New York City's cultural organizations.[3] Bicycling clubs, however, having easier parking, make it a destination.

See also

References
  1. Stephanie Slepian (March 2, 2008). "Where are all the Jobs? Non-Profits". The Staten Island Advance. Retrieved March 30, 2008.
  2. Sarah Johnson (May 2007). "From Staten Island to Shangri-La: The Collecting Life of Jacques Marchais". Orientations. Archived from the original on May 21, 2008. Retrieved March 30, 2008.
  3. Tim Heffernan (December 20, 2005). "Close-Up on Egbertville, Staten Island". The Village Voice. Retrieved March 30, 2008.
  4. Claire Wilson (August 17, 2001). "On an Island That's Worth Remembering". The New York Times. Retrieved March 30, 2008.
  5. "TibetanMaterialHistory - Biography of Jacques Marchais". tibetanmaterialhistory.wikischolars.columbia.edu. Retrieved July 31, 2017.
  6. Edward Wong (June 21, 1998). "Desperately Seeking Solitude; Prayer Flags Aflutter at a Tibetan Outpost". The New York Times. Retrieved March 30, 2008.
  7. "Treasures of Tibetan Art: Collections of the Jacques Marchais Museum of Tibetan Art". The Journal of the American Oriental Society. July 1, 2000.
  8. Grace Lichtenstein (August 26, 2007). "Boroughing into Staten Island". The Washington Post. Retrieved March 30, 2008.
  9. Maura Yates (March 1, 2008). "Sandy Ground Museum Easier to Find Thanks to New Highway Signs". The Staten Island Advance. Retrieved March 30, 2008.

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