The MBAO library becomes the Francis and Larissa Haskell Research Centre

The Musée des Beaux-Arts has received a donation of the library of art historian Francis Haskell (1928-2000), previously held at Oxford and soon to be integrated into the museum's collection. The collection includes a large volume of books on the history of French, Italian and Russian art from the ^16th to the ^19th centuries, as well as travel books from the ^17th century onwards. This library by two researchers, Francis Haskell and his wife Larissa, will contribute to the museum's intense research activity, and will be accessible free of charge to students and enthusiasts.

The museum would like to thank Larissa Salmina Haskell, Francis Haskell's widow and herself an art historian, as well as Iain Pears and Sir Nicholas Penny, the CFHA and its president Olivier Bonfait, for their generosity and support in preserving the memory of this great art historian, an Oxford professor who devoted his research to the social history of art, the history of taste and patronage.