Philadelphia Museum of Art

About

The moment you step through the door, what catches the eye is the natural light flowing beneath the wide, high ceiling, and the quiet shadows scattered across the dark wooden floor. Walking among the paintings and sculptures lined along the walls, you feel the tension of a space where Impressionism and medieval sculpture coexist. In the gallery holding Rodin's delicate sculptures especially, an air like a passing breeze wraps around the body, giving the illusion that time has stopped. Here, where sculpture and painting cross beneath a medieval ceiling, the space leaves behind the lingering trace of an old soul, like a quiet requiem. In the halls of Asian ceramics and architectural artifacts, tradition and aesthetics blend together and draw in the visitor's breath, until at last every sculpture and painting approaches like an old friend.