New Efforts Under Way to Keep Valuable Barnes Art Collection in Original Home
June 6, 2011 | Read Time: 1 minute
The owner of Argyrol—the century-old patent medicine that built Albert Barnes’ fortune—has offered a tenth of future sales proceeds to the Barnes Foundation if it keeps the late doctor’s famed art collection at its current suburban Philadelphia home, says the Associated Press.
Christine McKinney of Orange County, Calif., who has held the trademark for the silver and protein antiseptic compound for about a decade, said the donation depends on an international relaunch of Argyrol, a widely used treatment for sexually transmitted diseases, acne, shingles, and other conditions until it was supplanted by advent of antibiotics the 1930s.
The Barnes Foundation plans to close its gallery in Merion, Pa., next month and shift the collection of Impressionist and other masterpieces to a new downtown museum scheduled to open in June 2012. Several arts and citizens groups have long fought the move and are now seeking to reopen a lawsuit opposing the transfer.
The foundation said Sunday that it will invest $300,000 to revitalize the Merion site, Dr. Barnes’ former estate, which will continue to house an arboretum and host the organization’s offices and education programs, The Philadelphia Inquirer writes.
