Worcester Art Museum plans Higgins Armory exhibit with $40K grant
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The Worcester Art Museum.
The Worcester Art Museum is giving a permanent home to the antique weapons once held at the Higgins Armory with the help if a $40,000 grant from the National Endowment for the Humanities.
The museum announced plans for the new gallery Tuesday, which would be the second largest collection of its kind in the Americas.
The collection of arms and armor was acquired by the museum in 2014 after the John Woodman Higgins Armory in Worcester closed. The objects include arms, armor, and metalwork from around the world dating back to the 15th century.
Within the next five years, the museum plans to open a long-term installation to display almost the entire 2,000-tem collection in gallery displaces, open storage and innovative designs.
The permanent gallery will be the final phase of fully integrating the armory’s collection into the museum. The first exhibit - “Knights!” - opened March 2014, less than three months after the armory closed.
The "Samurai!” collection debuted in 2015.
“This award is a vital first step in helping us develop a powerful installation that uses this remarkable collection to excite general audiences about the humanities,” said Jeffrey Forgeng, interim director of curatorial affairs and curator of arms and armor and medieval art at WAM.
The museum's goal, Forgeng said, is to tap into the fascination with weapons to encourage visitors to explore stories behind the objects.
“People often assume that historical arms and armor are just tools to do a military job, but there’s much more going on: design and fashion, reality and fantasy, statements of personal identity, gender, social status, and cultural affiliation,” he said.
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