Crystal Bridges Museum of American Art

Crystal Bridges Museum of American Art
View across the upper pond along one of the museum's namesake bridges.
Established	November 11, 2011
Location	600 Museum Way Bentonville, Arkansas
Director	Don Bacigalupi
Nearest car park	Garage and surface lot on site (no charge)
Website	http://crystalbridges.org/

Crystal Bridges Museum of American Art is a museum of American art in Bentonville, Arkansas. The museum founded by Alice Walton and designed by Moshe Safdie officially opened on November 11, 2011. It offers free public admission.

Overview and founding

Alice Walton, the daughter of Wal-Mart founder Sam Walton, spearheaded the Walton Family Foundation's involvement in developing Crystal Bridges. The museum's glass-and-wood design by architect Moshe Safdie (Boston, MA) and engineer Buro Happold (New York, NY) features a series of pavilions nestled around two creek-fed ponds. The complex constructed by a joint venture of Linbeck Group (Houston, TX) and Nabholz Construction (Conway, AR) includes 217,000 square feet (20,200 m²) of galleries, several meeting and classroom spaces, a library, a sculpture garden, and a gathering space that can accommodate up to 300 people. Additionally, there are outdoor areas for concerts and public events, as well as extensive nature trails. It employs approximately 75 people, and is within walking distance of downtown Bentonville. The museum has amassed $488 million in assets as of August 2008, an amount that will increase as more pieces are continually added to the museum's collection. $317 million of the project's cost has been donated by Alice Walton. A 2011 Forbes' ranking of the world's richest people placed the Wal-Mart heiress at No. 21, with an estimated net worth of $21.2 billion.

In 2005, art historian John Wilmerding was hired for acquisition and advice on museum programming. Wilmerding commented that Alice Walton "will not spend at any cost" and will do her "homework on almost every individual acquisition and will ask for paperwork on market comparables". He stated that often when an artwork became available through a private sale Walton would state ‘Wait, it will come to auction where we can get it at a better price,’ and she was usually correct. He also stated that the museum instantly ranks at least in the top half dozen of American art museums. The museum's "quality and its range and depth already place it among one of the very best."

Headlines were generated after delays in construction and considerably higher costs for acquisitions and the museum itself than originally proposed to the city of Bentonville, Arkansas led to concerns about the favorable tax exemptions granted to the museum from the city in 2005 to secure its construction. Total tax losses to the state of Arkansas and the city of Bentonville are estimated at $17 million based on the financial disclosures given by the museum in the 2008 court case with Fisk University. The total amount of tax loss is estimated to have become considerably higher since then, but may never be disclosed due to the museum's guarded financial practices, including its decision not to disclose the amount spent since 2008 to secure collections, major art pieces, and lesser known works. However, the museum's IRS Form 990-PF notes acquisitions of $43.6 million during 2008, $81.9 million during 2007, $97.3 million in 2006. Through 2008, the total art acquisitions were at least $222.8 million.

Don Bacigalupi was appointed director of the museum in August 2009. Previously, Robert G. Workman had served as director. In early May 2011, the museum announced three endowments by the Walton Family Foundation totaling $800 million. These endowments were established for operating expenses, acquisitions and capital improvements. The operating endowment, totaling $350 million, is being used to fund the museum's annual operating expenses expected to total between $16–20 million per year. The acquisition endowment, totaling $325 million, will be used to fund additions to the museum's permanent collection. The remaining $125 million will be used as a capital improvement endowment to fund future improvements to and maintenance of the museum.

Collaboration with other museums and institutions

In the past few years, Crystal Bridges has been in the news for numerous arrangements and partnerships with other art galleries to share collections.

In 2006, the museum partnered with the National Gallery of Art in an attempt the purchase Thomas Eakins' The Gross Clinic from Thomas Jefferson University. Under the terms of the agreement, the two museums agreed to pay a record $68 million, but the university gave Philadelphia 45 days to match the offer. The Philadelphia Museum of Art and Pennsylvania Academy of Fine Arts agreed to collectively match the offer and the painting remained in Philadelphia. The purchase forced both museums to sell some of their best Eakins pieces including Cowboy Singing and the The Cello Player. In April 2007, Crystal Bridges acquired another Eakins belonging to Thomas Jefferson University entitled Portrait of Professor Benjamin H. Rand for an estimated $20 million

Walton held talks with Randolph-Macon Woman’s College in Lynchburg, Virginia in spring of 2007. The college was exploring selling part of the Maier Museum of Art's collection, but voted instead to sell select items from the collection at Christie's.

In 2007, Fisk University agreed to sell a 50% stake in a 101 piece Stieglitz collection to Crystal Bridges for $30 million. The collection was donated to the university by Georgia O'Keeffe. This agreement became tied up in a legal battle between Fisk and the Georgia O'Keeffe Museum in New Mexico, but the museum withdrew its lawsuit later that year. A judge ruled that the collection could possibly be sold to Crystal Bridges if modifications to the contract were made so that Fisk University could not lose its interest in the collection, nor could the joint venture holding ownership of the collection between Fisk University and Crystal Bridges be based in Delaware (or outside Tennessee Courts). The modified agreement would allow the works to stay at Fisk University until 2013 and then begin a two-year rotation with Crystal Bridges.

Crystal Bridges also reportedly has been in discussions with the High Museum of Art in Atlanta to share collections for an undisclosed sum.

Permanent collection

The museum's permanent collection features American art from the Colonial era to contemporary work. Notable works include a Charles Willson Peale portrait of George Washington as well as paintings by George Bellows, Jasper Cropsey, Asher Durand, Thomas Eakins, Marsden Hartley, Winslow Homer, Eastman Johnson, Charles Bird King, John LaFarge, Stuart Davis, Romare Bearden, Norman Rockwell, Mary McCleary and Walton Ford. Also included are works by Chuck Close, Jasper Johns, Norman Lewis, Alfred Maurer, Jackson Pollock and Tom Wesselman. Many of Crystal Bridges' paintings are currently on extended loan to other U.S. institutions. Two works, Richard Caton Woodville's War News from Mexico and Arthur Fitzwilliam Tait's The Life of a Hunter: A Tight Fix are included in American Stories: Paintings of Everyday Life, 1765–1915, a traveling exhibition organized by the Metropolitan Museum of Art. The Woodville painting was deaccessioned by the National Academy of Design, and was purchased in 1994 by Detroit collector Richard Manoogian. The piece was later purchased in 2004 by Crystal Bridges.

In May 2005, the museum purchased a coveted Asher B. Durand landscape entitled Kindred Spirits from the New York Public Library for more than $35 million in a sealed auction.

Sculpture also figures prominently in the collection, on view in interior galleries and along outdoor sculpture trails. Sculptors represented in the permanent collection include Paul Manship, Mark di Suvero, Ted Jones and James Turrell.

Select auction results for items in the collection are:

• Rose Garden by Maria Oakey Dewing, purchased 24 May 2000 for $1.16075 million
• Green River, Wyoming by Thomas Moran, purchased 5 December 2002 for $2.9245 million
• George Washington by Charles Willson Peale, purchased 18 May 2004 for $6.1675 million
• Robert Louis Stevenson and his wife by John Singer Sargent, purchased 19 May 2004 for $8.8 million
• Orca Bates by Jamie Wyeth, purchased 19 May 2004 for $360,000.
• The Studio by George Bellows, purchased 1 December 2004 for $2.472 million
• Portrait of Anne Page by Dennis Miller Bunker, purchased 1 December 2004 for $3.592 million
• The Indian and the Lily by George de Forest Brush, purchased 1 December 2004 for $4.824 million
• Spring by Winslow Homer, purchased 1 December 2004 for $2.024 million
• Wai-Kee-Chai, Sanky Chief, Crouching Eagle by Charles Bird King, purchased 1 December 2004 for $792,000
• Ottoe Half Chief, Husband of Eagle of Delight by Charles Bird King, purchased 1 December 2004 for $1.352 million
• A French Music Hall by Everett Shinn, purchased 1 December 2004 for $7.848 million
• Sick Puppy by Norman Rockwell, purchased 2 December 2004 for $511,500
• Portrait of Carolus Duran by John Singer Sargent, purchased 2 December 2004 for $724,300
• George Washington(The Constable-Hamilton Portrait) by Gilbert Stuart, purchased 30 November 2005 for $8.136 million
• Mrs. Theodore Atkinson, Jr. by John Singleton Copley, purchased 30 November 2005 for $3.376 million
• Marquis de Lafayette by Samuel F. B. Morse, purchased 30 November 2005 for $1.36 million
• Winter Scene in Brooklyn by Francis Guy, purchased 30 November 2005 for $1.024 million
• The Lantern Bearers by Maxfield Parrish, purchased 25 May 2006 for $4.272 million
• Still Life with Stretcher, Mirror, Bowl of Fruit by Roy Lichtenstein, purchased 20 June 2007 for £4.052 million
• Homage to the Square: Joy by Josef Albers, purchased 14 November 2007 for $1.497 million
• View of Mount Edna by Thomas Cole, purchased 29 November 2007 for $541,000
• Cupid and Psyche by Benjamin West, purchased 28 January 2009 for $458,500
• Our Town by Kerry James Marshall, purchased 13 May 2009 for $782,500
• Supine Woman by Wayne Thiebaud, purchased 12 November 2009 for $1.818 million
• Portrait of a Girl and Her Dog in a Grape Arbor by Susan Catherine Moore Waters purchased 7 March 2010 for $41,475
• Portrait of Martha Graham by Marisol Escobar, purchased 13 May 2010 for $116,500
• Dolly Parton by Andy Warhol, purchased 14 May 2010 for $914,500
• Standing Explosion (Red) by Roy Lichtenstein, purchased 14 May 2010 for $722,500
• The Return of the Gleaner by Winslow Homer, purchased 19 May 2010 for $2.2105 million
• Trinity by Adolph Gottlieb, purchased 11 May 2011 for $1.1425 million

Selected works in the museum collection

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  Portrait of George Washington (The Constable-Hamilton Portrait, 1797) by Gilbert Stuart

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  Cupid and Psyche (1808) by Benjamin West

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  Winter Scene in Brooklyn (c.1817-1820) by Francis Guy

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  Samuel Beals Thomas, with His Wife, Sarah Kellogg Thomas, and Their Two Daughters, Abigail and Pauline (1830) by Edward Dalton Marchant

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  View of Mount Edna (1843-44) by Thomas Cole

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  The Good Shepherd (1848) by Thomas Cole

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  War News from Mexico (1848) by Richard Caton Woodville

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  Kindred Spirits (1849) by Asher B. Durand

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  Portrait of Professor Benjamin Rand (1874) by Thomas Eakins

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  The Reader (1877) by Mary Cassatt

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  Green River, Wyoming (1878) by Thomas Moran

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  Robert Louis Stevenson and His Wife (1885) by John Singer Sargent

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  The Art Student: Portrait of James Wright (circa 1890) by Thomas Eakins

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  World's Columbian Exposition (1894) by Theodore Robinson

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  Excavation at Night (1908) by George Bellows

External links

• Crystal Bridges Museum of American Art website
• Bridges Acquires New Work by Walton Ford
• 'A Billionaire’s Eye for Art Shapes Her Singular Museum', Carol Vogel, The New York Times, 16 June 2011
• Bentonville123 History and Photography Bentonville Arkansas history and photograph archive