NEW YORK, NY.- The Morgan Library & Museum will present a major exhibition devoted to the life and career of its inaugural director, Belle da Costa Greene (1879–1950). The first-ever retrospective of Greene’s life, the exhibition celebrates both the centennial of the Morgan as a public institution and the 100th anniversary of Greene’s appointment as its first director. On view October 25, 2024 through May 4, 2025, Belle da Costa Greene: A Librarian’s Legacy will trace Greene’s storied life, from her roots in a predominantly Black community in Washington, D.C., to her distinguished career at the helm of one of the world’s great research libraries.
She was born Belle Marion Greener, but passed as white as Belle da Costa Greene, crossing the color line with her mother and siblings a few years after moving to New York City in the age of Jim Crow. She was widely recognized as an authority on illuminated manuscripts and deeply respected as a cultural heritage executive, making her one of the most prominent librarians in American history. Through extraordinary objects―from medieval manuscripts and rare printed books to archival records and portraits―the exhibition will demonstrate the confidence and expertise Greene brought to her roles as librarian, scholar, curator, and cultural executive and document her enduring legacy. The exhibition will be accompanied by a publication that includes new research offering revelations on Greene, as well as essays that illuminate her life, work, and impact.
Curated by Philip S. Palmer, Robert H. Taylor Curator and Department Head of Literary and Historical Manuscripts, and Erica Ciallela, Exhibition Project Curator, Belle da Costa Greene: A Librarian’s Legacy sheds light on the challenges and triumphs of Greene’s tenure as director of what was then known as the Pierpont Morgan Library―a groundbreaking role she held for twenty-four years—defying expectations for women and pioneering programs for access. In shaping the narrative of Greene’s life and career, Palmer and Ciallela worked with an Advisory Committee comprising librarians, historians, and professors from institutions across the country with specialized interest in the themes of the exhibition. Greene’s legacy can be felt in the collections she shaped and stewarded, which she believed should be open to researchers and enjoyed by the public. Scholarship and access remain guiding principles for the Morgan to this day, as demonstrated by its robust exhibitions, research services, public programs, digital resources, and more.
“Belle da Costa Greene’s influence is both long- lasting and expansive,” said Colin B. Bailey, Katharine J. Rayner Director of the Morgan Library & Museum. “As we conclude our centennial year, we are honored to present this landmark exhibition, which returns to the founding of the Morgan as a public institution and celebrates Greene’s pioneering contributions not just to the Morgan, but to the fields of librarianship and museology more generally.”
Greene is well known for her instrumental role in expanding and developing the exceptional collection of rare books and manuscripts amassed by the American financier J. Pierpont Morgan, who hired her as his librarian in 1905. Her extraordinary accomplishments in this role have inspired a number of fictional adaptations, such as The Personal Librarian by Marie Benedict and Victoria Christopher Murray (Berkley, 2021) and Belle Greene by Alexandra Lapierre (Flammarion, 2021), which have garnered widespread public interest in Greene’s story. Through significant new research, this exhibition presents other aspects of her life that have not been well understood to date, including her career as director and aspects of her education, her private collecting, and the dense social and professional networks she established. “Greene’s professional papers, letters, and archival material at the Morgan allow us to identify and hear her voice in roles that were important to her—as a director, as a mentor, as a friend,” said Erica Ciallela. “We’ve taken the time to try and understand who she really was, letting her voice lead the way.”
New discoveries include the earliest known photograph of Greene, the first letter she is known to have sent, the only known photograph of her mother, and objects revealing details of her first library job at Princeton University. Loans of examples from Greene’s personal collection of art and jewelry illuminate her tastes as both a collector and a social force in the cultural life of New York City. Featuring items from over a dozen lenders, many of which have not been brought together since Greene’s death in 1950, the exhibition will allow many dimensions of her life to emerge for the first time. Archival gaps remain in the story of Greene and racial passing, in part due to her choice to destroy her personal papers before her death. In the 1890s, Greene’s mother changed the family surname from Greener to Greene, and the family began to pass as white in a racist and segregated America. The exhibition examines the complexity of this decision through the context of American history and creative representations of racial passing in literature, visual art, and film, illuminating the strategies through which various individuals and literary characters negotiated their identity during this period.
The exhibition also demonstrates Greene’s impressive acquisitions: the Crusader Bible; the Amherst Caxtons; Rembrandt etchings; old master drawings; and literary drafts by Elizabeth Barrett Browning, Honoré de Balzac, and Edgar Allan Poe. As one of only two women on the auction floor, she famously bid nearly $50,000 to secure the unique surviving copy of Sir Thomas Malory’s Le morte d’Arthur, issued by the first English printer, William Caxton, in 1485. When acquiring literary manuscripts, Greene showed a
marked preference for rough drafts: “I am eager to get the first draft of a book or poem in mss— and note the differences—the growth of the idea—or the betterment of the expression.” Near the end of the exhibition, visitors will see two of Belle Greene’s final acquisitions, a letter by Frederick Douglass and an Ethiopian Gospel Book made for Princess Zir Ganela.
In 1924, Greene was appointed director of the Pierpont Morgan Library. The exhibition explores the growth of the Morgan as a public educational institution under her leadership as well as Greene’s place among her contemporaries in librarianship, specifically Black librarians working in New York City.
Research Initiatives
With the exhibition’s opening, two major research projects will launch for the benefit of the public. The Letters of Belle da Costa Greene to Bernard Berenson, created in partnership with I Tatti, The Harvard University Center for Italian Renaissance Studies, documents the relationship between Greene and Italian Renaissance art historian, scholar, and connoisseur Bernard Berenson (1865–1959). The project will result in a publicly available digital platform featuring high-resolution images and transcriptions of over six hundred letters, with rich metadata documenting names, places, and subjects mentioned in letters Greene wrote to Berenson between 1909 and 1949. The letters capture Greene’s vibrant wit and voice while shedding light on libraries and museums in the early twentieth century, the history of collecting, and other topics, such as the urban development of New York City and life during the two world wars.
Also in October 2024, the Morgan will augment existing online resources about Greene with Belle da Costa Greene: A Portrait Gallery. From drawings and paintings to photographs and sculpture, the visual iconography of Greene is a rich source for understanding her life, career, and personality. This new resource will bring together every known portrait of Greene, including several recently discovered photographs. The gallery will also include mass-media reproductions of these images, which were widely distributed in newspaper and magazine articles, as a way of tracing how likenesses of Greene were deployed by the press and encountered by readers. In conjunction with the exhibition, the Morgan has developed a series of short videos about Belle da Costa Greene’s letters, professional work and mentorship, and ongoing legacy, as linked below. Always available online, these videos will be highlighted in the Clare Eddy Thaw Gallery from October 18, 2024, to January 12, 2025.
