Thomas Hoving, who as director of the Metropolitan Museum of Art acquired many of its most celebrated treasures and attracted some of its most notorious controversies, has died as a result of cancer. He was 78.

Born in New York to Mary and Walter Hoving, who served as the head of jewelry giant Tiffany & Company, Thomas Hoving received his B.A., M.F.A, and Ph.D. from Princeton University, joining the Met’s medieval department after completing his studies.

His tenure as director of the Met extended from 1967 to 1977, during which time the museum acquired the Temple of Dendur, Velázquez's Juan de Pareja, and the Euphronios krater, which was returned to Italy last year. The temple and the Velázquez are among the Met’s most beloved pieces today, though Hoving courted controversy at the time for his willingness to spend sums that many trustees viewed as excessive to acquire such pieces.

After departing the Met, Hoving wrote prolifically, publishing 15 works on topics as far-ranging as art forgeries, Andrew Wyeth, and his own life; serving as an arts reporter for the television newsmagazine 20/20; and running Connoisseur magazine. Responding to the charge of a critic that his career had “floundered” during and after his time at the Met, he responded with trademark verve, declaring that those positions were “a helluva way to flounder.”

Earlier this year, Hoving reportedly told writer Michael Gross, who has written a history of the Met, “I'm a goner… But I have no regrets. I've had a terrific life.”