Museum’s reopening after a two-year closure bridges past and present with an ambitious expansion and an extraordinary Michelangelo exhibition.
By Hannah Serrano / Photo Above By Stephen Salpukas/William & Mary
After nearly two years of closure, the Muscarelle Museum of Art at William & Mary is unveiling a transformation that will shape its future for generations. In February 2025, the Muscarelle reopened with an ambitious expansion and an extraordinary Michelangelo exhibition, marking a defining moment in the history of the museum, originally established in 1983.
A Bold Evolution
What was once an intimate museum is now a far more commanding presence. The $46 million expansion, funded largely by a $20 million estate gift from Martha Wren Briggs, adds 42,000 square feet of gallery and educational space, nearly tripling its exhibition capacity.
Designed by Pelli Clarke & Partners, the new structure honors the museum’s past while boldly embracing its future. Notably, the iconic color tubes on the front facade—an artwork by Gene Davis from the 1980s—have been preserved, maintaining a visual link to the museum’s original identity.
The reimagined Muscarelle is designed for immersion. A grand atrium, anchored by a floating staircase and sky bridge, opens into 14 galleries on the second floor, where masterpieces both historic and contemporary will be displayed with renewed significance.
The addition of a study center, art-making and seminar spaces, a café and a museum store on the first floor transforms the space into a dynamic gathering place where art is not simply observed but engaged with.
“Martha Wren Briggs envisioned a museum where every William & Mary student could experience the power of art,” says Julie Tucker, the museum’s marketing and events manager. “This expansion is a fulfillment of that promise.”
Museum Director David Brashear, who has been involved with the Muscarelle’s vision for decades, emphasized the importance of the expansion.
“You have to achieve a certain level of scale before you can be broadly considered a destination by the masses, worthy of stopping in,” Brashear explains. “I think we’ve crossed that threshold because we’ve gone from five galleries to 14 galleries. And when you walk through the building, it’s massive. It’s almost hard to digest.”
Michelangelo’s Genius in a New Light
The reopening is accompanied by a landmark exhibition, Michelangelo: The Genesis of the Sistine, offering an intimate glimpse into the master’s creative process. The exhibition presents 25 rare preparatory sketches for the Sistine Chapel ceiling and The Last Judgement, including seven works never before seen in the United States.
Michelangelo was famously secretive about his methods, destroying many of his sketches to guard his artistic process. The surviving works offer a rare window into his mind, tracing the evolution of his vision from rough concept to masterpiece.
Among the highlights is a recently identified drawing thought to be Michelangelo’s earliest sketch for the Sistine Chapel. In a moment of historical reconciliation, the Muscarelle will also reunite two long-separated studies of apostles, bringing them together for the first time in centuries.
“Michelangelo’s hand is still alive in these drawings,” says Curator of Special Projects Adriano Marinazzo. “They reveal his struggles, his revisions, his moments of doubt and triumph. They bring us closer to him than any finished fresco ever could.”
Marinazzo’s journey to uncover these works has been years in the making.
“Thirteen years ago, I was in Florence, living, teaching at the University of Florence, and I was still friendly with Casa Buonarotti,” he explains. “I had full access to these archives, hundreds of years old, and I came across a little piece of paper. I thought, ‘This—this is a ceiling.’ Maybe this was the first sketch, the first seed of the masterpiece.”
The exhibition experience itself has been designed to echo the reverence of the Sistine Chapel. Walls painted in a deep, celestial blue and softened lighting—not to mention timed entry—will encourage visitors to experience Michelangelo’s work with the quiet intensity it deserves.
Preserving the Past, Embracing the Future
The Muscarelle’s expansion is not just about space—it’s about permanence. The museum’s enhanced storage capacity will allow it to better preserve and display its 8,000-work collection, which includes pieces by Rembrandt, Andy Warhol and Georgia O’Keeffe. A revitalized exhibition schedule will bring new energy to these works, ensuring that visitors encounter them in ever-evolving contexts.
Brashear, reflecting on the museum’s mission, underscores its evolving role.
“We’ve taken part of our original charter from the Board of Visitors, which was to serve as the cultural center for the visual arts between Richmond and Norfolk, because there wasn’t really anything at that moment in time. And we’ve always taken that part of our job very seriously.”
For Brashear, this moment has been years in the making.
“We are all so incredibly excited to get back to the business that we’re here to do. There’s so much creative thinking, engaging with the students, engaging with the community. We’ve had a lot of time down, a lot of time to plan for this. Now, we’re fired up to do it.”
Marinazzo echoes this excitement, emphasizing the importance of discovery even within well-known masterpieces.
“Michelangelo was a great engineer, a great innovator. Why is the Renaissance still so important? One reason is that it remains embedded in our cultural consciousness. The Creation of Adam is still current. And second, with new technologies, we can see and rediscover something that is still relevant to us. There are still discoveries to be made.”
With its expansion complete and its doors reopened, the Muscarelle Museum of Art is entering a new chapter—one defined not by grandeur, but by purpose. The museum stands as a testament to art’s ability to bridge past and present, inviting visitors to experience history in a way that is both immediate and lasting. As Michelangelo’s lines and gestures resurface from the centuries, so too does the Muscarelle, ready to leave its mark on the future.
This is more than a reopening. It is a renaissance in its own right. Learn more at muscarelle.wm.edu.
This article: A Renaissance at the Muscarelle Museum has been curated from our friends at Go Williamsburg and the original in it's entirety can be found here: https://gowilliamsburg.com/a-renaissance-at-the-muscarelle-museum/
