Though the decision to move the Barnes Foundation’s world-renowned collection from its original home in Lower Merion, Pennsylvania, to its current location on the Benjamin Franklin Parkway in 2012 was controversial, the merits of its art holdings are undoubtedly staggering. The founder, Albert C. Barnes, a wealthy chemist who invented the medicine Argyrol, amassed one of the leading collections of works by impressionist and modernist masters, including Vincent Van Gogh, Pablo Picasso, Henri Matisse and Henri Rousseau. The Barnes also has the distinction of housing the largest single collection of paintings by Pierre-Auguste Renoir and Paul Cézanne—including the latter’s ultra-famous works The Card Players and The Large Bathers. With so many noteworthy artists, it’s no wonder that the museum’s 4,000 works are worth an estimated $25 billion.
