Crystal Bridge and Art Bridge acquire 90 contemporary local art works

The American Museum of Art and Bridge of Arts Foundation in Bentonville, Arkansas has acquired 90 contemporary Native art works from the John and Susan Horsman series based in St. Louis, focusing on supporting Native and African American artists.

The acquisition includes Kent Monkman, Tyrell Tapaha, George Morrison, Oscar Howe, Jaune Quick-to Seee Smith, Rick Bartow, Kay Walkingstick, James Lavadour, Emmi Whitehorse, Brad Kahlhamer, Cannupa Hanska Hanska Hanska Luger, Rose B. Simpson, Roxanne Swentzanne Swentzell and Tccann. The two organizations will split the works, nine of which will enter the Crystal Bridge and the remaining 81 will be added to the collection of the Bridge of Arts.

“The horseback collection has such a rich collection,” said the museum’s Indigenous art curator Jordan Polman Cock (Kiowa/tonga). Artnews. “The artist tells stories about the collective history before the United States.”

The acquisition of Crystal Bridges is part of an overall collection strategy for the museum to expand its holdings in local arts and crafts. (Crystal Bridges recently purchased a major Tiffany Studios window.) Although the museum’s focus is on American art, its local art holds only about 120 works, accounting for about 3% of its total collection.

“Indigenous perspectives are the basis of any American art collection,” said Ashley Holland, director of the Art Bridge curation program.

Founded in 2017, Art Bridges introduces a funding exhibition of American art in the United States. Recently, it has started building its own collection. (In 2023, it acquired a painting by Robert Colescott for $4.5 million.) Art Bridges’ work is available to more than 250 partner organizations, mainly regional museums, and can lend them long-term loans. The Cavaliers acquisition brought its total holdings to about 250 works, and local art now accounts for one-third of its stake.

Crystal Bridges last major acquisition of 2020’s Aboriginal Art when it received work from collector Bruce Hartman. The acquisition includes works by early 20th-century artists from New Mexico, such as the self-taught artists of San Ildefonso and the Santa Fe Indian School, and five/six artists in Kiowa, Oklahoma.

However, acquisitions of Native art of this scale are still rare in American museums. About a decade ago, in 2017, the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York received a gift of 91 works from Diker Collection, which received a comparable work from Diker Collection.

The two-part acquisition of the horse riding will soon appear. The Arts Bridge section will be on display at an exhibition at Alice L. Walton Medical School, which will be open this summer on the Crystal Bridges campus. The exhibition, which opens on November 3, will view art as a center for local life and rehabilitation. Three works – Cannon’s This is a good day to die (1970), Svenz Corn mother is crying (2015) and Monkmann Save newcomers (2023) – Watch it next year on Crystal Bridges, part of its campus expansion. Other works conducted in 2027, including in the exhibition “Beauty”, will trace the history and contemporary art of indigenous peoples.

Following the Bentonville show, Art Bridge will begin borrowing from the acquisition of horseback to the works of its partner agencies, with a focus on ensuring accurate display and interpretation of the leased works and “build a long-term, mutual relationship with the community, not just checking the boxes over the next 5 years,” Holland said.

John Horseman said he was motivated to hand over his work to the Crystal Bridge and Art Bridge, hoping that contemporary local art would be placed with the works of non-local artists. “They will be fresh air, consciousness,” he said of the work he has been collecting since 2012.[Ojibwe painter] George Morrison should be considered a great abstract artist, side by side with Willem de Kooning, next to the painters of Kent Monkman and Hudson River School. ”

Since joining Crystal Bridges in 2023, Cocker has been thinking about how museums can do such displays and “display a model to understand how to work with indigenous artists and communities and unfold in a variety of ways,” she said, which is located in Crystal Bridges in CADDO, OSAGE, OSAGE, OSAGE, OSAGE, OSAGE, OSAGE, OSAGE, OSAGE, OSAGE, and QUAPAW CREATY and ARTRAINE and ANDARTIAL and ANDRARINE and antral and antral and antral and and antral and and restral and and restral and and restral.

She continued: “Arkansas is crying, so the performance should be led by its survivors, the museum should create space for joy and continuity and educate people about where they are: Bentonville, Arkansas.