Doorway

An item at Metropolitan Museum of Art

A number of playful elements enliven this otherwise sober doorway. A bear and a fox dance in the keystone at the top, while other animals, some realistic, some fantastic, grace the foliated capitals at eye level. Long appreciated on stylistic grounds for its resemblance to monuments found near Tours, this doorway comes from a small church about fifty miles southeast of the city. The main structure of the church was sold into private hands in the nineteenth century, and the main portal was moved to nearby Villeloin-Coulangé; it entered the collection of George Grey Barnard before 1925.

Medieval Art and The Cloisters

An exhibit at Metropolitan Museum of Art

The Museum's collection of medieval and Byzantine art is among the most comprehensive in the world. Displayed in both The Met Fifth Avenue and in the Museum's branch in northern Manhattan, The Met Cloisters, the collection encompasses the art of the Mediterranean and Europe from the fall of Rome in the fourth century to the beginning of the Renaissance in the early sixteenth century. It also includes pre-medieval European works of art created during the Bronze Age and early Iron Age.

Metropolitan Museum of Art