STATEN ISLAND, N.Y. —The Noble Maritime Collection, the unique art and history museum located at Snug Harbor Cultural Center and Botanical Garden in Livingston, is extending its gallery hours for the summer.
For the first time, the museum will add Wednesdays to its schedule starting on July 10 through the end of August. The expanded summer hours will be Wednesday through Sunday from noon to 5 p.m.
The museum offers a pay-what-you-wish admission policy in honor of its namesake, Staten Island artist and sailor John A. Noble (1913-1983), who believed in access to the arts for all.
“Summer has only just begun, and we have already seen an uptick in visitors from across the city, the nation and the world,” said Noble Maritime Collection Executive Director Ciro Galeno Jr. “That is why we are so excited to be able to offer more time for people to discover the museum and all of its exhibitions, especially John Noble’s charming houseboat studio.”
In addition to its permanent exhibitions that interpret New York’s working waterfront and the history of Sailors’ Snug Harbor, the 19th-century retirement home for mariners, the Noble Maritime Collection presents changing exhibitions, two of which are new for this summer.
“Noble Industrial” is a recently opened exhibition of nearly four dozen of Noble’s rarely seen lithographs, paintings and drawings, all of which contextualize him within the 20th century in which he lived and worked as an artist and advocate for New York’s maritime industries.
Included in the exhibition is “Candles of the Kill,” a painting that depicts an oil refinery that once stood on the New Jersey side of the Kill Van Kull, opposite Snug Harbor. Noble’s sons consider it amongst his finest works.
Also on view is “The Sea, the City, & the Golden Hour: Impressionist Maritime and Urban Landscapes,” by Robert Padovano, a new and vibrant exhibition of over two-dozen paintings by the contemporary Staten Island artist. Highlights include 12 new paintings that Padovano created, such as “Sunset Haze, New York Harbor,” a view of the sun rising over the East River that pays homage to Monet’s interpretations of the River Thames in London.
The expansion of the Noble Maritime Collection’s gallery hours aligns with other Snug Harbor Cultural Center attractions, including the New York Chinese Scholar’s Garden and the Staten Island Museum.
“We are always looking for ways to work with our cultural colleagues to create an even better and more seamless visitor experience at Snug Harbor,” added Galeno. “As the Noble museum has limited resources, we are grateful to our new volunteer docents for giving us their time so that we can be open to the public on Wednesdays this summer.”
ABOUT NOBLE MARITIME COLLECTION
The Noble Maritime Collection has a long history of community support, most especially from the Noble Crew, a volunteer corps that restored the museum’s landmarked building — a former sailors’ dormitory that operated from 1844 throughout the 1990s.
In addition to its volunteers and museum members, the Noble Maritime Collection is currently supported, in part, by public funds from the New York City Department of Cultural Affairs in partnership with: the City Council and councilmembers Joseph Borelli, David Carr and Kamillah Hanks; Staten Island Borough President Vito Fossella; and the New York State Council on the Arts, with the support of Gov. Kathy Hochul and the New York State Legislature.
It is additionally supported by grants from the Staten Island Foundation, Northfield Bank Foundation and the New York City Tourism Foundation.
The Noble Maritime Collection is located in Building D at Snug Harbor Cultural Center and Botanical Garden, 1000 Richmond Terrace.
For more information, call (718) 447-6490 or visit noblemaritime.org.