By Pastor Shin Tan and Tsem Rinpoche

At one of the highest points on the eastern seaboard, rural fieldstone buildings that resemble a Tibetan mountain monastery sit atop Lighthouse Hill. Founded in 1945, this “Jewel on a Hillside” is home to one of America’s most extensive collections of Himalayan artefacts and was “the only museum devoted solely to Tibetan art in the world” when it was founded.

Jacques Marchais’ love of collecting Himalayan artefacts culminated in the building of an institution that served as a bridge for the west to discover the exotic art and culture of Tibet through this little piece of Shangri-la, inspired by a photograph of the Potala Palace in Lhasa, the historic seat of the Dalai Lamas.

The two main flat-roofed Himalayan-style buildings with trapezoidal-shaped windows, cross cut wood posts and slate caps above doorways house the library and the museum. Meditation cells, or small meditation rooms were also built a level below the main buildings.

Historically known as The Jacques Marchais Center of Tibetan Art, what is now referred to as The Jacques Marchais Museum of Tibetan Art sat on a three-acre piece of land at its peak. Unfortunately, ancillary parts of the property were sold off after Marchais’ death.

The Visionary

“If I can give the world something that would be uplifting and a genuine help, perhaps, I should try.”

Source: Letter to Kate Crane-Gartz (1933)

Jacques Marchais in her younger days

Born Jacques Marchais Coblentz in Cincinnati, Jacques began her career as a child elocutionist in Chicago after the passing of her father to support her family. She was known as Edna Coblentz or Edna Norman and performed in plays such as “A White Lie” and “A Modern Match”, as well as in private recitals at the homes of Chicago’s wealthiest families.

She was cast in George Ade’s play, “Peggy From Paris” in Boston when she was 16, and it was here that she met her first husband, an MIT student, Brookings Montgomery. They had three children and divorced in 1910. Her children lived with their paternal grandparents.

Moving to New York to pursue her acting career, she became part of the social circle of artists, writers, intellectuals and those who shared a common interest in Eastern religions, civilisations and philosophies. She then married Harry Klauber, the owner of a chemical factory from Brooklyn.

Marchais explained that her interest in Tibetan art was ignited during her childhood when she played with a collection of 13 Bön deity figurines owned by her great-grandfather, a merchant from Philadelphia active in the tea trade, John Joseph Norman.

“Being a student of Oriental philosophy and acquainted with Eastern religions – I soon found that I was acting more or less as a magnet in drawing East Indian and Tibetan deities and ritual objects to me.”

Source: A letter to Senator Edward E. Denison of Mairon, IL (June 2, 1939)

She started her collection of Tibetan and Indian art in the late 1920s, purchasing items from dealers, auctions, and private individuals. Moved by the 1933 exhibition at the Century of Progress International Exposition, “The Chinese lama temple, Potala of Jehol”, Jacques opened the Jacques Marchais Gallery in Park Avenue, which featured Indian and Tibetan art pieces such as thangkas, statues and wood furniture.

The Jacques Marchais Tibetan Art Gallery at 40 East 51st Street, off Park Avenue in Manhattan, New York

A feature article “Far Eastern Art Exhibited: Jacques Marchais Gallery to Open Tuesday” published in the New York Sun on 3^rd December 1938 stated that her collection was something new for Asian art enthusiasts. It also highlighted Marchais’ unique standing in this field.

“New York, except for a few enlightened ones, does not pay much attention to the arts of India. One reason, of course, is that outside of museums there is a small chance of seeing and studying these objects … Not all the objects in Jacques Marchais’s collection are of Indian origin, however. Many are from China and Tibet … There are examples of Tibetan painting, which astound by their freedom of treatment and their boldness of execution. Not only was the subject matter new in the art world, but Marchais was pioneering in being a female business owner and collector in an overwhelmingly male field.”

The gallery was a method to finance the construction of the Center. She sold various items through the gallery, but always kept the best items as her own to be displayed in the Center in the future.

Building the Potala of the West

“I only started this gallery as a fore-runner for the miniature copy of the Potala of Lhasa, which I hope to build on our hill adjoining the gardens, within the next five years. I hope to build it large enough to house 300 people at a time. It will be, of course, of fieldstone – the interior done in the colour conducive to peace and meditation – with a huge Buddha smiling down upon them in a benevolent benediction.”

Source: Letter to Claude Bragdon (February 6, 1940)

Marchais’ husband, Harry Klauber was supportive of her vision and they purchased the land adjacent to their home in Staten Island to build the Center (The Jacques Marchais Center of Tibetan Art).

Joseph Primiano, an Italian immigrant and master stone mason was hired from the 1920s through the 1940s to build the two stone buildings, together with other carpenters and gardeners. The library was built and opened on 29^th July 1945 to house her extensive collection of “books on occult subjects, Asiatic Art, Comparative Religions, Symbolism, Colour, etc.”, with the purpose of building a research and reference library for scholars.

Later on, the “Temple Room” or “Chanting Hall” (the museum) was built, which she was very much involved in personally, from picking every stone for the building to making the prayer wheels herself.

Jacques Marchais and husband Harry Klauber

The Jacques Marchais Center of Tibetan Art was incorporated in 1945 as a not-for-profit educational institution dedicated to the understanding and preservation of Tibetan art and culture.

‘Samadhi Garden’ was the name given to the terraced gardens surrounding the properties, with a large fish and lotus pond. Marchais described,

“One is shut away from the world up here on our hill – in the hanging, walled-in garden of my dreams. Still, one may look out over the valley into the distance and gaze at the sea, watch the ships go out to foreign lands, the sun rise over water in the morning and the reflection of shimmering silver cast by the moon at night.”

Her wish was to share this garden with her friends who felt the need to retreat from the city to find peace and heavenly quiet, yet not be too far away.

Marchais continued to travel each day back and forth to the gallery from Staten Island while building the Center.

An article in Life Magazine published on 8th December 1947

Unfortunately, Marchais died four months after the opening of the museum, and her husband died seven months after her. In a letter to her husband, Harry Klauber, in 1945, Jacques Marchais wrote, “You have worked hard to help me set this jewel of Tibetan Art in a setting worthy of it!! Please God it may never be broken up! It stands as a great monument to our love! May it be of as great a cultural benefit to the world as we have dreamed it might!”

Klauber, who was the benefactor and executor of her estate, in return wrote in his will that all properties, including the buildings, residence, museum, library, garages, shops, outbuildings, gardens and adjoining city lots were to be preserved into a Memorial for his late beloved wife, setting aside $25,000 from his estate for the perpetual care of this Memorial.

The Center later went through difficult times, suffering from neglect and mismanagement. Things became better when a paid director was hired, and later, an experienced curator. In 2005, renovations were done to the two buildings. Various works to preserve the collection and to make them more accessible to researchers and the general public were also done.

The Center

With an impressive 120-foot stone wall facade, the Center has two buildings of historic importance. Both buildings have exterior walls of uncoursed fieldstone with Himalayan architectural characteristics. One of the buildings was built to be the library while the other was to be a museum.

The Library

With windows and doors facing south, the ground floor of this 1,200 square foot building originally housed Marchais’ extensive collection of around 2000 books as well as her office. Items such as rugs and furniture were also exhibited here. Since 1972, the library building has been assigned to administrative use. Apart from office space, it also houses a gift shop.

You can view the library’s online catalogue here: http://www.librarything.com/catalog/tibetanmuseum

The Museum

This building is the main exhibition area with a space of 1,400 square feet. The north wall has a three-level display that resembles a Tibetan altar.

The collections include items of Tibetan, Sino-Tibetan, Chinese, Mongolian, and Nepalese origin, with most originating from the 17^th to the 20^th centuries. You will find deity statues in materials such as brass, bronze and copper, a good collection of thangka paintings, metalwork, jewellery, dance masks, and much more. It also has in its collection a set of silver ceremonial implements belonging to a previous Panchen Lama.

You can view the museum’s collection here:

• Paintings: https://www.himalayanart.org/search/set.cfm?setID=2025
• Masterworks: https://www.himalayanart.org/search/set.cfm?setID=4098
• Sculptures: https://www.himalayanart.org/search/set.cfm?setID=2026

Samadhi Garden

This is a terraced garden with fieldstone retaining walls interwoven throughout the property, stone pathways and other stone features. It also has a large fish and lotus pond built out of the hillside, next to the meditation cells.

Her Legacy Continues

“My all has been given to this venture – my strength, my health, what little money I had, the collection and the building of the Library and Museum. There has not been one bit of outside help! I have not needed it. No reward is expected, other than the realisation of my one ambition – which has been to house in permanent buildings my books and a replica, as near as possible, of a Tibetan ‘Chanting Hall’ with its golden altars, deities, religious implements, etc. For it is to prove to be a cultural benefit to those persons of the Western World who are seeking a better understanding of their Oriental brothers – their art, their religion and their philosophy.” (November 30, 1944)

Marchais’ concept of the Center was very precise, and she knew what she wanted to build. She didn’t hire an architect, and in her own words, “I was able to prove to myself that one woman could do it if the talent was great enough and the urge and willingness to work hard was strong enough.”

What was amazing was that neither Marchais nor Joseph Primiano, the Italian master stone mason, had been to Tibet. The building was built based on their studies of images from her collection of books. It is said that many visitors today, from Tibet and Dharamsala, India, have commented that the buildings remind them of home. The museum was also praised for its authenticity by His Holiness the Dalai Lama when he visited in 1991.

Marchais was a pioneer and a collector in a field that was predominantly male, and “had a tough pull” putting her Tibetan Art Gallery on its feet. For her however, the gallery was only a stepping stone towards doing something she felt would be of help to humanity in the long run. Apart from her own gallery (and later the museum), she also helped build private collections, such as that of Nasli Heeramaneck, who is said to have owned “one of the finest private collections of South Asian and Himalayan art in the world.”

The Center continues to present ongoing programs, such as lectures, workshops, cultural events and so on to promote awareness of Tibetan culture. It hosted an audience of 700 people during His Holiness the 16^th Karmapa‘s second tour of the United States. Since the 1960s, the Center has also been one of the venues where Geshe Wangyal, one of the pioneers teaching Tibetan Buddhism in the United States, and other lamas conducted talks and chanting programs. The Center’s museum also lends items from its collection to other museums and institutions for exhibitions and publications.

Historical Pictures

Jacques Marchais sitting on her Chinese red lacquer chair on opening day of the Museum, October 5, 1947.

Jacques Marchais standing behind prayer wheels in her Tibetan temple

An old picture of the museum exterior and the lotus pond

An exterior shot of the structure in 1945

Library interior, 1947

The famous three-tier altar

On the opening day

Pieces from the collection

Pieces from the collection

Pieces from the collection

Pieces from the collection

Pieces from the collection

Surrounding the Museum

Current Exhibits

VIDEO: Exploring the Jacques Marchais Museum of Tibetan Art

Or view the video on the server at:
https://video.tsemtulku.com/videos/ExploringTheJacquesMarchaisMuseum.mp4

References

• Biography of Jacques Marchais https://tibetanmaterialhistory.wikischolars.columbia.edu/Biography+of+Jacques+Marchais
• Jacques Marchais Center of Tibetan Art on National Register of Historic Places https://www.nps.gov/nr/feature/landscape/2010/center_tibetan_art.htm
• A Woman Named Jacques Founded a Tibetan Museum on Staten Island https://bigapplegreeter.org/woman-named-jacques-founded-tibetan-muse-staten-island/
• The Jacques Marchais Center of Tibetan Art in State Island https://www.shambhala.com/snowlion_articles/the-jacques-marchais-center-of-tibetan-art/
• Jacques Marchais – The visionary behind Staten Island’s Shangri-la https://www.tibetanmuseum.org/jacques-marchais-herstory
• Directions to Jacques Marchais Museum of Tibetan Art
  https://www.tibetanmuseum.org/directions
• “The Potala of the West”: Constructing the Jacques Marchais Museum of Tibetan Art https://www.tibetanmuseum.org/potala-of-the-west
• Jacques Marchais Museum of Tibetan Art https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jacques_Marchais_Museum_of_Tibetan_Art

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