The Colorado Springs Fine Arts Center’s art collection began with a gift. Beginning in the 1930s, major gifts of Hispanic and Native American art from Alice Bemis Taylor and Modern American art from Elizabeth Sage Hare formed the foundation of the FAC’s permanent collection. Since then, gifts of art have constituted a majority of the FAC collection through today with the recent gift of 50 works from the Herbert and Dorothy Vogel Collection.
To celebrate the generosity of the donors, the FAC will showcase the most recent gifts from the past two years in Lasting Legacy: A Selection of Recent Gifts to the FAC Collection, at the FAC MODERN from through November 15, with an Opening Celebration on Sept. 4 in conjunction with the First Friday Art Walk.
Daryl Trivieri (American, born 1957), Untitled (Renaissance Portrait of a Woman in Profile), 1990. Acrylic on canvas, 30 x 30 inches
This exhibition will feature works – most on view for the first time – from artists Joe Baker, Herbert Bayer, Agustín Bejarano, Thomas Hart Benton, Scott Fraser, Jessica Freyre-Cuebas, Roberto Fabelo, Quintín González, Joel Grey, Carlos Guzmán, Carlos Hoyos, Diego Lama, Jason Lujan, Roberto Matta, Yasbel María Pérez, Robert Polidori, Louis Recchia, Boardman Robinson, William Scharf, Brett Weston, Randy L. White, as well as selections from the recent gifts from William T. Tutt and the Herbert and Dorothy Vogel Collection.
Exhibition Highlights
• Adam Fuss (Untitled, 1997, manipulated photograph), Don Hazlitt (Sunset, 1989, mixed media on canvas), and Sylvia Plimack Mangold (Untitled, 1988, woodcut on vegetable parchment paper), gifts from the Vogel Collection.
• Ave Convertida Echando Vuelo (2006, xylography) by Jessica Freyre-Cuebas, a gift from the artist
• Cat, two contemporary works on paper by Native American Joe Baker, a gift from Theodore Waddell.
• An Iris Print on Crane Museo Paper, Brioni (Artist’s Proof), by Academy Award winning actor Joel Grey, a gift from the artist
• A 1990 Sol LeWitt gouache on paper, Untitled; a gift from Werner Kramarsky
• Three color lithographs by Chilean artist Roberto Matta, a gift from Roberto Agnolini
• Gwen Laine’s photo-based installation work, Silent Origin III, from 2008, a gift from the artist
• Longtime New Yorker, former guard at the Metropolitan Museum of Art and one-time Mark Rothko studio assistant, William Scharf contributes Storm on the Wind Beach, a gift from the estates of Douglas S. McKelvy and Francine S. McKelvy
• Jason Lujan’s mixed media Apache Ma.K. series, a gift from the artist
• A selection of retablos and bultos, gifts from William Thayer Tutt
Recent Major Gifts
Herbert and Dorothy Vogel
In 2009, the Fine Arts Center received a gift of 50 works of art from New York collectors Dorothy and Herbert Vogel, with the help of the National Gallery of Art, the National Endowment for the Arts, and the Institute of Museum and Library Services (IMLS) as part of a national program entitled The Dorothy and Herbert Vogel Collection: Fifty Works for Fifty States with 50 works going to a selected art institution in every state. The FAC received works by Will Barnet (b. 1911), Adam Fuss (b. 1961), Michael Lucero (b. 1953), Sylvia Plimack Mangold (b. 1938), and Richard Tuttle (b. 1941).
Herbert Vogel, a postal clerk, and Dorothy Vogel, a librarian, who managed to build what has been called one of the most important contemporary art collections in history with very modest means. In the early 1960s, the couple began purchasing the works of unknown artists. Devoting all of Herb’s salary to purchase art they liked, and living on Dorothy’s paycheck alone. Within these limitations, they proved themselves curatorial visionaries; most of those they supported and befriended went on to become world-renowned artists.
Wynn Kramarsky
In 2009, collector Werner “Wynn” Kramarsky gave the FAC 19 contemporary works on paper. Kramarsky’s collection of 4,000 works is organized around the parameters of minimalism, post-minimalism and conceptual art and has garnered praise from critics and artists alike. Kramarsky has developed an eye toward both young and established artists and both are represented in this gift. Artists such as Sol LeWitt and William Anastasi are internationally renowned and historically important, while Eve Ascheim and Nancy Haynes are among those in the gift who are up-and-coming.
Katherine and Dusty Loo
In 2007, the FAC announced a promised gift of 67 Colorado landscape painting from the Katherine and Dusty Loo Collection, considered to be one of the most comprehensive and significant collections of historic Colorado paintings. Notable works include: Victor, George Biddle, 1937; Sunset, Robert Reid, circa 1921; and Waterfall, Colorado, Ernest Lawson, circa 1927. Biddle taught at the FAC in 1936. Reid’s Sunset features the Broadmoor Hotel in the background; he was instrumental in the establishment of the Broadmoor Art Academy, the precursor to the Bemis School of Art. Lawson was the Director of Landscape Painting at the Broadmoor Art Academy and taught classes during the summers of 1927-1930.
William Thayer Tutt
In 2007, the Fine Arts Center’s Latin American collection was strengthened by a gift of 56 artworks. The gift was presented by Claire Ellis to honor the wishes of her prominent stepfather William Thayer Tutt. All works are religious pieces, mostly retablos (paintings on tin or wooden panels) and bultos (carvings in the round) from throughout Latin America.
Early Historic Gifts
A series of early gifts in the first three decades set the foundation of the FAC Collection.
1930s Alice Bemis Taylor’s initial gift of Native American and Southwestern Art
1940s Katherine Harvey’s gift of 111 Navajo sand paintings
Elizabeth Sage Hare’s gift of 28 paintings, drawings and sculptures of Modern art
1950s Gifts included amazing Modernist paintings such as Iris by Georgia O’Keeffe, Fog Horns by Arthur Dove, Fishermen at Work by Milton Avery and Christ Evicted by Marsden Hartley
Walt’s Kuhn’s extraordinary suite of 29 paintings, An Imaginary History of the West, gifted by Kuhn’s wife and daughter.
Fine Arts Center The Colorado Springs Fine Arts Center, established in 1936, is a privately funded, non-profit art museum, performing arts theatre and arts education center. Built on the foundation of the prestigious Broadmoor Art Academy, the FAC carries the legacy of Colorado’s arts and cultural heritage. One of 17 charter members of the American Association of Museums, the FAC offers the best in the world of visual arts via its permanent collection and travelling exhibitions, performing arts through the FAC Theatre Company, and arts education with the Bemis School of Art. The FAC building is considered an architectural landmark in the Rocky Mountain region, designed by John Gaw Meem, and is listed on the National Register for Historical Places. In 2007, the FAC unveiled a $28.6 million renovation and expansion. For more information, visit csfineartscenter.org.
