Creative Growth’s artists with developmental disabilities, seen in 2020, are among those whose works are being acquired by the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art. (Diana Rothery)
SAN FRANCISCO – The San Francisco Museum of Modern Art announced the acquisition of more than 150 works by 23 artists with developmental disabilities from three Bay Area art centers. It is the largest acquisition focused on the disability community in the museum’s history.
Creative Growth of Oakland represents 113 works in the acquisition, while Creativity Explored of San Francisco represents 31 and NIAD Art Center of Richmond includes 12. All three organizations were founded by Florence and Elias Katz and are dedicated to working with artists with developmental disabilities . Art includes works on paper, painting, sculpture, film and textiles.
“We hope this is a landmark acquisition that encourages and sets a benchmark for other institutions,” said Katy Siegel, research director of special programs initiatives at SFMOMA. “This is an important first step in an area where many people have been working for decades, most notably Creative Growth, NIAD and Creativity Explored. We are aware that we are playing catch-up and have an enormous amount of work to do.”
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Siegel said conversations with organizations were in progress when she and SFMOMA director Christopher Bedford joined the staff in 2022 (they previously worked together at the Baltimore Museum of Art) and that there was broad support among staff toward the artists. The acquisition felt like an important step in the museum’s commitment to presenting “a history of local and global art that is expansive, multidimensional and diverse,” Siegel said.
In his first interview with the Chronicle in 2022, Bedford said his desire to expand the museum’s collection to tell a people-centered social history of art rather than a stylistic history meant collecting and displaying more works by artists with disabilities, including other underrepresented groups in the collection.
“The story we have been telling is incorrect because it is biased and structured by bias,” Bedford said in the interview above. “Through our acquisition and exhibition activities, we are engaging in a fully conscious act of reparation that aims to narrate a history of art as it really happened.”
For six decades, the Bay Area has led the conversation about the inclusion of artists with developmental disabilities in the art world at large. The founding of Creative Growth in 1974 coincided with the region’s role in creating the disability rights movement, as well as its involvement in other intersectional causes, including LGBTQ rights, gender equality, and black power. . All of the art centers have gained significant local and international followings and have collaborated with companies such as Target and fashion brands such as Marc Jacobs, Levi’s and Comme des Garcons. Works by the organizations’ artists are featured at major international art fairs and are in the collections of major museums, including the Museum of Modern Art in New York and the Smithsonian American Art Museum in Washington, DC.
Selections from the Creative Growth acquisition will be displayed in an exhibition at SFMOMA in April. Artists represented include Dan Miller, Camille Holvoet, Judith Scott, Susan Janow, Dwight Mackintosh, John Martin, Donald Mitchell, William Scott and Ron Veasey. The museum has also commissioned Scott to create a site-specific mural for the exhibition.
“Our 50th anniversary will be next year, so it’s a wonderful time,” said Creative Growth CEO Ginger Shulick Porcella. “It has taken us 50 years to get our artists to this point. These artists who have historically been marginalized and once called “outside artists” are now inside the world’s most important institutions. “For SFMOMA to acquire works on this scale gives it context: this is some of the best contemporary art you will see, whether the artists have disabilities or not.”
SFMOMA said the acquisition is the beginning of a three-year partnership with Creative Growth with plans to create programs, further evaluate accessibility needs at the museum (including the use of seating areas) and eventually incorporate art from all three organizations to the permanent collection. galleries. The museum hopes to acquire more works from all three organizations.
In addition to the exhibition, the museum plans to host the annual Creative Growth Symposium and the 50th Anniversary “Beyond Trend” Gala and Fashion Show featuring clothing created by Creative Growth artists in 2024. Both events are known for attracting fans and collectors, including celebrities such as musicians. David Byrne, actress Mindy Cohn, writer Mickey Boardman, philanthropist Agnes Gund and Paper Magazine founder Kim Hastreiter.
This is not SFMOMA’s first outing with either organization. In 2019, NIAD artist Marlon Mullen won the museum’s prestigious Society for the Advancement of Contemporary Art award, and in 2020 the museum’s gift shop collaborated with Creativity Explored on a line of cloth masks. The acquisitions join works by Judith Scott, William Scott, Mullen, Dan Michiels of Creativity Explored and Alice Wong of Creative Growth.
The news comes after important years for the three art centers. Creativity Explored celebrates its 40th anniversary, while NIAD marked the milestone in 2022. The three organizations are the subject of the exhibition “Into the Brightness: Artists from Creativity Explored, Creative Growth & NIAD” at the Oakland Museum of California, which It can be seen until January. twenty-one.
“Our visionary founders, Florence Ludins Katz and Elias Katz dreamed of Creativity Explored, NIAD and Creative Growth,” said Linda Johnson, CEO of Creativity Explored. “Their innate understanding of the value that disabled artists bring has meant a better life for people with disabilities around the world and a richer, more real artistic world for all.”
NIAD Executive Director Amanda Eicher said collaboration and partnership are at the core of the organization’s work and that “many NIAD artists would echo the sentiment that inclusion in one of the most important collections of modern art of the world is incredibly significant to your work and your visibility. “The artists who practice in our studios are passionate about their leadership role in the art world, and this acquisition reflects another way in which NIAD artists are redefining contemporary art.”
Siegel said he hopes the acquisition and partnership will prompt museums to think about expanding their collections to include more artists with disabilities.
“I think any time a museum of the scale and reputation that SFMOMA has makes a gesture of this magnitude, it changes things,” Siegel said. “Other museums feel a sense of permission, or at least a sense of curiosity, about what that would look like in their own institutions.”
© 2023 San Francisco Chronicle
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