Utah Museum of Fine Arts

The Utah Museum of Fine Arts (UMFA) is Utah's primary resource for culture and visual arts. It is located in Salt Lake City, Utah on the University of Utah campus near Rice–Eccles Stadium. Works of art are displayed on a rotating basis. It is a university and state art museum. Today the Utah Museum of Fine Arts allows the public opportunities to experience different cultures from its extensive art collections.

Overview

The Utah Museum of Fine Arts is accredited by The American Alliance of Museums.^[2] It has a cafe and store located inside the building along with more than 20 galleries. Permanent art collections for the Utah Museum of Fine Arts include over 17,000 works of art. The different cultures represented include African, Oceanic and the New World, Asian, European, American, and the Ancient and Classical World.^[3]

History

The creation of a formal art gallery on the top floor of the University of Utah's Park Building in the early 1900s marks the physical birth of the Utah Museum of Fine Arts. In the beginning, paintings by local artists filled this three-room gallery. Through the next six decades, the art department at the University of Utah received major art gifts and specific requests from donors to remodel the gallery into a museum. After the renovation of the gallery was finished, the University’s president, A. Ray Olpin, established it as the Utah Museum of Fine Arts on May 6, 1951.^[1] In 1967, Frank Sanquineti was appointed as the first professional director. By this time, the Museum had entered a new period of growth which resulted in the building of a new museum.

After the Museum’s relocation in 1970, its goal was to focus on the continuation of expanding its collections and the Annual Friends of the Art Museum Acquisition Fund was formed. Over the years this Annual Fund has helped support the expansion of the Museum’s collections and its ability to offer art education programs. Thanks to the generous patrons, local and national foundations, the University community, and the citizens of the State of Utah, the UMFA’s collection now encompasses 5,200 years of artistic creativity. Since the mid-1900s, when the collection was around 800 objects, it has grown to over 13,000 art objects. This huge expansion required the building of yet another museum, and with the help of many generous donors the construction of a new 70,000-square-foot (6,500 m²) building was started in 1997. The UMFA opened in the Marcia and John Price Museum Building on June 2, 2001 and David Dee was appointed Executive Director the following year.

Since the second relocation, the UMFA has experienced unprecedented growth in all areas of operation. In February 2005, the Utah State Legislature declared the UMFA as an official state institution, confirming the importance of the Museum’s role as a center for art, culture, and education in the state of Utah. In April 2009, David Dee resigned from the Museum and Gretchen Dietrich was appointed Interim Director. Gretchen Dietrich was named Executive Director effective August 2010.^[4]

Since the beginning, the UMFA has made it a priority for its collections to represent principal artistic styles and world cultures. Today the UMFA strives to provide everyone with the opportunity to experience different ideas, values, and cultures from its extensive art collections.^[1]

Events and Programs

The Utah Museum of Fine Arts offers family, adult and children's programs along with tours for visitors of all ages. Activities include self-guided visits of the galleries, hands-on art projects, films, lectures, and informative guided tours. Family programs offer studio art activities on the third Saturday of each month. Adult programs include painting classes, lectures, and fine arts film series. Children's programs include special summer classes where children may combine history with art making. There are also classes for parents and their children from ages 2–5 to learn how to paint and sculpt.^[5]

Past Exhibitions

Exhibitions at the Utah Museum of Fine Arts generally change on a two to three month basis. Some examples of past exhibitions since 2007 include:

• Splendid Heritage: Perspective on American Indian Art (February 10, 2009 – March 1, 2010) premiered an extraordinary exhibition of cultural and artistic treasures from the John and Marva Warnock Collection with 149 objects of unique artistry and cultural expression from the Native people of the Northeast and Plains.

• Monet to Picasso from the Cleveland Museum of Art (June 23 – Sept. 21 2008) included Impressionist, Post-Impressionist and Early Modernist paintings from 100 years of European masterworks in an international touring exhibition.

• Suitcase Paintings: Small Scale Work by Abstract Expressionists (Jan. 19 – Mar. 29 2008) which included around sixty works of intense beauty that exhibited energy found in larger works.

• Andy Warhol's Dream America: Screen prints from the Collection of the Jordan Schnitzer Family Foundation (Oct. 4, 2007 – Jan. 6 2008) included around 100 screen prints by internationally acclaimed artist Andy Warhol.

• Cinderella: Masks, Magic and Mirrors (Sept. 2 – Mar. 31 2008) which included materials from Asia, Africa, Europe, and the Americas. This exhibit explored key themes from Cinderella including the magical mirror.

• Picturing the West: Masterworks of 19th Century Landscape Photography (Oct. 6 – Dec. 30 2007) included 32 nineteenth century American Western landscape photographs.^[6]

See also

• Mormon art

References

External links

• UMFA's Official Website

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