 Perhaps the best known nativity scene in America is the Neapolitan Baroque <unk> displayed annually in the Medieval Sculpture Hall of the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York City . Its backdrop is a 1763 choir screen from the Cathedral of Valladolid and a twenty @-@ foot blue spruce decorated with a host of 18th @-@ century angels . The nativity figures are placed at the tree 's base . The crèche was the gift of Loretta Hines Howard in 1964 , and the choir screen was the gift of The William Randolph Hearst Foundation in 1956 . Both this presepio and the one displayed in Pittsburgh originated from the collection of Eugenio <unk> . 
