Throughout the past few weeks, newspaper, magazine, and television reporters have done stories about 2010: the year in review. Some of the memories are uplifting, while others. . . .
Remember the anguish waiting for the Chilean miners to be rescued? Or, the lurching of your stomach as images of the Gulf oil spill repeatedly crossed the television screen. Thankfully there are the inane as well: American Idol tryouts (my guilty pleasure), and ongoing speculation about Brett Favre’s retirement (yes, finally!), and the continuing saga of any number of pop culture personalities (think Lindsay Lohan and Charlie Sheen). The list is long, and it makes me grateful to be anonymous and dull.
While preparing year-end accounting reports, I found inspiration for this blog. With that thought in mind I share this impressive chronicle of 2010 acquisitions and collection development.
Ten 2010 Woodson Art Museum Collection Tidbits
1. The Museum collection comprises 4,629 artworks. This includes, 
paintings, works on paper, sculpture, photographs, ceramics, glass, and textiles.
2. In the past year, 383 artworks were added to the collection. This number includes ten paintings, twenty sculptures, and 353 works on paper.
3. Artist gifts in celebration of the Museum’s 35th 
anniversary increased the drawing collection holdings to 918 works.
4. Works by Rembrandt Bugatti, John Steuart Curry, Morris Graves, Anna Hyatt Huntington, Andy Warhol, and Andrew Wyeth were acquired.
5. The bequest of Virginia Nepodal Eckelberry included 241 paintings by Don Richard Eckelberry, as well as 81 artworks from their personal collection.
6. Four outdoor sculptures, cleverly concealed on the Museum grounds,
are part of “Seek & Find” an interactive family activity.
7. The installation of Eagle III, by sculptor Gwynn Murrill, brings the number of large-scale outdoor sculptures found on the Museum’s grounds to nineteen.
8. The Museum acquired eleven works from the 2010 Bird in Art exhibition. In fact, 312 works previously included in Birds in Art are now in the collection.
9. Liquidity, by Chris Bacon, was acquired in memory of 
Museum founder John E. Forester.
10. Alan and Paul Singer donated
fifteen of their father Arthur’s paintings, joining previous gifts that total 147 works in the collection.
