| Ben Shahn, Hunger, undated, gouache on composition board, 39"x 25", from The Permanent Collection of The Jule Collins Smith Museum of Fine Art at Auburn University. |
Although a variety
of factors led to the genesis of the museum project, perhaps no single event
exerted more influence than the purchase in 1948 of what has become known
as Auburn University's Advancing American Art Collection. Comprised of 117
paintings that had been collected by the United States State Department,
the collection was auctioned as war surplus. Hearing of the auction and
recognizing an historic opportunity, Frank Applebee, then Auburn's head
professor of art, gathered funding from an art department to enter the State
Department auction. Taking advantage of a 95 percent discount offered by
the government to qualified purchasers, Applebee was able to purchase 36
paintings for $1,072. Described as the art bargain of the century, many
of these paintings represent the finest works ever executed by such luminaries
of the American art scene as Ralston Crawford, Ben Shahn, Georgia O'Keefe,
John Marin, Jacob Lawrence, Arthur Dove and Romare Bearden. Although now
valued at between $7 and $10 million, the arrival of the collection on campus
did little initially to arouse interest in constructing an art museum at
a land-grant university. Indeed, the collection entered an unfortunate period
when it was neglected for years and could be found hanging in faculty and
administrative offices throughout the university. In the early 1970s, during
the administration of Auburn University President Dr. Harry Philpott, the
Hargis Foundation of Alabama provided funds to renovate a university building - the
Langdon Annex - into a gallery space for the Advancing American Art Collection.
More funding was not forthcoming, however, and the renovation never took
place. It was another 20 years before the dream of an art museum on Auburn's
campus re-surfaced. Anything Goes Broadway Tickets Discount How To Succeed In Business Without Really Trying Tickets
In 1992, the art museum project was given new life when Auburn University
received one of its most extraordinary gifts. Through the efforts of then
President Dr. William V. Muse, Dr. Gordon C. Bond, Dean of the College of
Liberal Arts, and Dr. Joseph Gluhman, Art Department Chairman, philanthropist
Susan Phillips of Brewton, Alabama agreed to donate to Auburn one of the
nation's largest collections of John James Audubon prints. The collection
had been amassed by Phillips' grandfather and continued to grow through
the efforts of her grandmother, Louise Hauss Miller. Ms. Phillips' generosity
toward the museum project continued when, in 1994, she and her brother Allen
Phillips authorized the Louise Hauss Miller Foundation to grant Auburn an
additional $1 million to create an endowment for the care of the Audubon
collection and the construction of galleries dedicated to the continuous
exhibition of selections from The Louise Hauss and David Brent Miller Audubon
Collection.
The Phillips' gifts were vitally important to the growth of the museum project.
The university now possessed not only two distinctive art collections of
unquestionable quality but had funding specifically earmarked for the construction
of an Audubon gallery. The movement to construct a museum building on Auburn's
campus now gained significant momentum. In 1997, Dr. Charles D. Hudson '50
of the Fuller E. Callaway Foundation donated $500,000 toward the museum's
construction. Hudson's work with the Callaway Foundation had played a vital
role in establishing museums in the LaGrange, Georgia area. The Callaway
Foundation gift, combined with an anonymous gift and the earlier gifts from
the Hargis and Miller foundations, now placed nearly $1.7 million in the
museum building fund.
These funds were more than doubled when, in February of 1998, Houston businessman
Albert Smith '47 committed $3 million toward the construction of the museum
building. A native of Montgomery, Alabama, and a 1947 mechanical engineering
graduate, Mr. Smith made the gift to honor his wife, Jule '99 and to commemorate
the Smiths' 50th wedding anniversary. During the announcement of the gift,
the Auburn University Board of Trustees passed a resolution declaring that
the museum be named The Jule Collins Smith Museum of Art. Later, at the
museum groundbreaking ceremony, Mr. Smith explained his motivation for making
the gift. "As we approached our 50th wedding anniversary, I began searching
for a fitting tribute to this kind, loving, very intelligent, Christian
wife and mother. I wanted something that would be both lasting and would
benefit others, and I knew the latter would mean more than anything to her."
As early as 1992, Dean Gordon Bond and the Campus Building Committee identified
Paul Rudolph, Auburn's most distinguished architectural graduate, to design
the building. Rudolph, the retired former head of the Yale University College
of Architecture, required assistance in the design and building process,
and in June of 1996 proposals were sought by the State Architect's office
from architects interested in collaborating with Rudolph on the museum's
design. In October of that year, the Birmingham office of the firm Gresham,
Smith and Partners headed by Batey Gresham '57 was selected to work with
Rudolph on what was then a $2.9 million project. In early 1997, it was disclosed
that Mr. Rudolph was suffering from incurable lung cancer and was unable,
despite tenacious effort while battling the disease, to initiate work on
the project. In July of 1997, interviews were held for architects interested
in handling the complete design of the museum building. In November, Gresham,
Smith and Partners was notified that they had been awarded the contract
for the building.
In July, 1998, the AU Board of Trustees determined the site of the museum
to be the intersection of College Street and Woodfield Drive. This site
encompasses nearly 20 acres and lies at the gateway of Auburn University.
Becoming available through the cooperation of the Alabama Agricultural Experiment
Station and the AU College of Agriculture, the museum shares the site with
The Cullars Rotation, the oldest soil fertility experiment in the South
and the second oldest continuous cotton experiment in the world-second only
to Auburn's own Old Rotation. A 40-foot perimeter maintains the integrity
of the experiment as an important part of the museum grounds, and it stands
as a constant reminder of Auburn's land-grant mission.
In January, 2000, Dr. Michael De Marsche was appointed the founding Director
of The Jule Collins Smith Museum of Fine Art at Auburn University. Under
his exemplary leadership, a program to extend museum membership to the community
was established and a museum Advisory Board was created. Throughout 2000,
the design process on the museum building proceeded, as funding for the
project continued to grow. In January 2001, the AU Board of Trustees passed
a resolution increasing the original 1996 museum construction budget of
$3,500,000 to the final budget of more than $13 million. In December of
2001, the local firm of Conner Brothers Construction was awarded the contract
to construct the building of The Jule Collins Smith Museum of Fine Art at
Auburn University.
By May of 2001, construction of the museum was well underway. As construction
progressed on its building, the museum continued to be the beneficiary of
significant support from friends, alumni and community members. A longtime
arts enthusiast, 1958 Auburn textile engineering alum, and former CEO of
Russell Corporation, Dwight Carlisle has played a significant role in the
formation of the art museum. Elected the museum Advisory Board's first President,
Carlisle has created important endowments which support the administration
of the museum during the critically important years leading to its opening.
Betty Grisham, a well-known regional artist, has worked tirelessly to establish
museum endowments, made numerous gifts of art work and has made a significant
contribution. Kathryn '60 and Noel Wadsworth '60 have offered constant support
to the museum project including gifts of art and $500,000 to the museum
project for the construction of The Kathryn and Noel Wadsworth Gallery.
The museum opened to the public on October 3, 2003.