Taking the First Step Toward Cozier Norton Simon Museum

The first phase of a $3-million renovation at the Norton Simon Museum in Pasadena opens today. Four refurbished galleries--handsomely outfitted with new stone and wood floors, raised ceilings, improved lighting and walls painted warm beige and mulberry--offer a preview of an extensive project designed by architect Frank O. Gehry that will completely transform the museum’s interior.

“I’m very excited about the way it’s going,” museum President Jennifer Jones Simon said of the renovation. “It will create a much more intimate experience for the public. The exhibition spaces are smaller, so people will have a more personal encounter with the art. Some people have found the museum’s long halls almost overwhelming. This will make the museum more enjoyable and accessible.”

Interior changes are in tune with Norton Simon’s philosophy of art, she said. Her late husband--who began collecting in the 1950s after making a fortune in food processing--was famous for informing himself about potential purchases and picking the brains of scholars. But he also had personal requirements for adding works to his collection, she said. “He would say, ‘If it speaks to me, if it tells me something about myself, I have to have it.’ ”

Gehry, a member of the museum’s board of trustees, is giving the facility a new look with the help of garden designer Nancy Goslee Power; when their work is complete, in a year or so, every square inch of the interior will be revamped. Outside, the building will be unchanged, but new landscaping will create a more inviting, informal setting with a tea house as its focal point. Meandering ponds will replace the rectangular reflecting pool and sculpture will be displayed in surrounding gardens.

What goes on view today is the southeast wing of the museum’s upper level. Galleries that formerly displayed works by Picasso, Matisse, Van Gogh and other 19th and 20th century artists now contain prime examples of much earlier European art. They range from Gothic-style religious paintings to 17th century Dutch landscapes and still lifes.

As visitors turn left from the lobby, they will get their first clue that things are not the same at the Simon. The central gallery on the south side has not been renovated yet, but it has a new installation of six monumental cartoons for tapestries, designed by Giovanni Francesco Romanelli to illustrate the story of Dido and Aeneas. Formerly hung in a hallway, they can finally be seen at a proper distance.

Looking left from the Romanelli gallery, changes are dramatically apparent. At the far end of the refurbished wing is “The Coronation of the Virgin Altarpiece,” a multi-panel painting in tempera and gold leaf, created in 1344 by Guariento di Arpo. It’s the spectacular centerpiece of a gallery of 14th and early 15th century art that includes “The Branchini Madonna,” designed by Giovanni di Paolo for the Branchini family chapel in the Church of San Domenico, in Siena, Italy.

An adjacent gallery holds three large tapestries, one to a wall. Lucas Cranach the Elder’s life-size paintings, “Adam” and “Eve,” hang on either side of the door. Nearby, a walk-in niche displays three Flemish pictures: “The Resurrection” by Dieric Bouts; “The Blessing Christ” by Hans Memling; and “The Coronation of the Virgin” by Gerard David.

The largest gallery--illuminated by a new skylight--holds Italian Renaissance and Mannerist works including such jewels as Raphael’s “Madonna and Child With a Book,” Jacopo Bassano’s “The Flight Into Egypt” and paintings by Filippino Lippi and Botticelli. Moved from a relatively cramped room with rounded corners, the paintings now have room to breathe. The new arrangement also makes it easier to make comparisons among the artworks.

The building, designed by Ladd & Kelsey to display modern and contemporary art, opened in 1969 as the Pasadena Art Museum. Simon took charge of the debt-ridden museum in 1974 and reopened the facility in 1975 after renovating the building and installing his own collection. Few changes have been made during the last 20 years.

Designed with curves instead of corners and equipped with makeshift lighting that cluttered the ceilings, the structure has never been an ideal place to display art. Gehry has essentially constructed a building within a building to square off the galleries, clean up the spaces and provide greater expanses of usable wall space as well as intimate viewing areas.

The next phase of the project will be the northeast wing, devoted to 19th century art. Plans include moving the bookstore to make room for a new gallery. When the entire renovation is complete, the European collection will be shown in roughly chronological order, with Renaissance through 18th century works on the south side and 19th and 20th century works on the north. Indian and Southeast Asian art, which has been displayed on both floors of the museum, will be exhibited in contiguous spaces on the lower level.

The museum will remain open during most of the renovation, except for a yet-to-be-named period when the entrance and lobby are under construction.

* Norton Simon Museum, 411 W. Colorado Blvd., Pasadena, (818) 449-6840. Today-Sunday, noon-6 p.m. Special holiday hours: Dec. 19-Jan. 5, noon-6 p.m. daily. Closed on Christmas and New Year’s Day. Admission: $4.