Collecting Plaster Casts at The Metropolitan Museum of Art

ABSTRACT In the nineteenth century, museums collected copies of works of art with the aim of presenting outstanding works to a broader public and to serve as inspiration for artists and manufacturers. The Metropolitan Museum of Art acquired a significant collection of plaster casts in the first decades after its founding in 1870. During the twentieth century, interest in the cast collection, which included over 130 reproductions of works from ancient West Asia, subsided, and many were given to other institutions. Among the works remaining in the Ancient West Asian Art collection are casts that were originally part of the display of the Crosby Brown Collection of Musical Instruments of All Nations, as well as a modern version of the so-called Flood Tablet. A renewed interest in these casts as well as the original collection offers an opportunity to explore their past, present, and future roles within the museum and beyond.