ANNUAL REPORT 2016 - 2017 TABLE OF CONTENTS FROM THE DIRECTOR 2 WHAT WE DO A R T 3 THE MUSEUM SCHOOL 7 HOW WE DO IT COMMUNITY SUPPORT 9 DONOR CIRCLE 1 0 VOLUNTEERS 1 1 S T A F F 1 2 FINANCIAL POSITION 1 3 HOW ARE WE DOING? BY THE NUMBERS 1 4 WHY WE DO IT M I S S I O N 1 5 FROM THE DIRECTOR I continue to count my blessings as I reflect on this, my 4th year as Director of the Mobile Museum of Art. In the past four years, our art museum has undergone a transformation—thanks to the efforts of countless volunteers, supporters, government entities, and the ongoing efforts of our talented staff. 2017 was designated as the first in a three-year commemoration of our state’s Bicentennial—officially launched in Mobile in May of 2017! This happy occasion afforded us the perfect opportunity to celebrate our state’s art and artists. We quickly concluded that our first Alabama Bicentennial exhibition must obviously be a celebration of William Christenberry’s work, which we titled CHRISTENBERRY: In Alabama. His lifelong love of his native state, and our state’s enduring admiration for him and his legacy as demonstrated through the rich Christenberry collections in Alabama’s museums, provided the focus of this first Bicentennial celebration. Generously underwritten by the Crampton Trust, established by Katharine Crampton Cochrane, and bolstered by additional funding from the City of Mobile and the Alabama State Council on the Arts—we mounted a joyous exhibition celebrating Bill Christenberry, the Christenberry family’s creative lineage—restricting that project to works loaned by Alabama’s own institutions, and the Christenberry family. With a modest publication, active programming and abundant stories shared by all who knew and loved Bill—we kicked off our state Bicentennial with Christenberry style (right down to the inclusion of Alabama’s red earth and his studio collection of signs). Never a museum to approach anything halfway—we added two other Alabama-specific exhibitions to coincide with CHRISTENBERRY: In Alabama. We invited the talented Richard McCabe, photography curator and artist from the Ogden Museum of Southern Art, to select and install photographs by the next generation of this state’s photographers—all of whom were thrilled to be included in the same period and place as Bill Christenberry. That exhibition, Contemporary Alabama Photography, later traveled to Houston Baptist University’s art gallery for a second wind, introducing those Alabama artists to a new audience. A second addition to our Alabama artists in 2017 was master glass artist, Rene Culler’s glorious site-specific installation of glass entitled The Mobile Delta: Glass & Light. That installation took the artist a full year to create, and continues to fascinate viewers with its changing aspects at different times of the day and night. There were other exhibitions—collection-based installations of our glass and ceramics selected by the creative duo of Rachel and Tony Wright (both instructors in the art department of the University of South Alabama). But this past year will always have a special place in our hearts for its celebration of our state’s artists. Glass, photography, mixed media, whatever the medium, 2017 reminded us once again that Alabama artists are simply the best. We’re lucky to have them all! Deborah Velders Director Mobile Museum of Art WHAT WE DO ART COLLECTION AMERICAN ART: 1945 to the Present November 13, 2015 - December 31, 2017 This exhibition features art and decorative arts created since World War II, as American art emerged as a major force in the global art world. MMofA possesses many works in its collection that represent major American artists whose contributions to the history of art are signicant. Many of these works have seldom been on view (if at all). This major installation includes both nationally and regionally recognized artists. NATURE IN 19th CENTURY EUROPEAN ART January 3, 2017 - February 4, 2018 19th century Europe saw a century of philosophical, economic, and political changes that came about in both gradual and quiet waves, as well as violent revolutions. Through all of these changes, European artists responded by providing insightful windows into their worlds with beautiful romantic landscapes, animals, and the nobility of human labour. SERIOUS WHIMSY, SERIOUS PLAY: Glass and Ceramic Selections from the Collection July 7, 2017 - ongoing The pieces selected by Rachel Wright and Tony Wright for this diverse show have a sense of joy in the forming and/or the content of the work. The artists explore whimsical subjects, or demonstrate a sense of experimentation in their artistic practices. “Curating this exhibition,” the Wrights explain, “was like creating a mosaic: selecting various pieces of glass or ceramics for their color or form, while still keeping in view the overall synergy of the many parts.” NEW ACQUISITIONS: 2017 (Photography) June 29, 2017 - February 22, 2018 This exhibition is the rst public presentation of a new acquisition of photographs through The Museum Project. The work offered is all from veteran photographers - primarily based in California, most with long careers in teaching; all with extensive exhibtion records and representation in museum collections. NATIVE AMERICAN ART from the Collection August 11, 2017 - ongoing This exhibition of Native American art and artifacts drawn from the museum’s collection features early 20th century photographs and hand-colored lithographs of Native American peoples, as well as textiles, baskets, fetish and utilitarian beaded crafts, and a single contemporary metal relief made by various Native Americans. Native American nations represented by art and artifacts include Apache, Assiniboine, A’aninin (Gros Ventre), Lakota Sioux, Cherokee, Cheyenne, Choctaw, Navajo, Teton/Western Sioux, Tohono O’Odham (historically Papago). Photographs feature Arizona Apache, and early 19th century hand-colored lithographs by McKenney and Hall, Co. (after paintings by Charles Bird King) feature chieftans of various Native American nations, including Creek, Chocktaw and others. SPECIAL EXHIBITIONS CHRISTENBERRY: In Alabama March 10 - July 9, 2017 The exhibition consists of over 90 Christenberry works including paintings, drawings, sculptures and photographs, drawn from university collections at Auburn and Tuscaloosa and in Alabama’s major city museums in Birmingham, Huntsville, and Montgomery. It also includes a ”prologue” installation featuring the Christenberry family’s creative lineage and legacy over four generations, and an installation of the artist’s famous studio wall of southern signs, collected during his annual journeys southward. This installation pays tribute to the artist’s ongoing “love affair” with the rural South—as the exhibition honors the state’s dedicated support of the artist and his work. CONTEMPORARY ALABAMA PHOTOGRAPHY March 10 - September 24, 2017 Contemporary Alabama Photography, guest curated by Richard McCabe, looks to the current trajectory of photography being practiced throughout Alabama, and highlights the work of eleven emerging, mid-career, and established photographers: April Dobbins, Jenny Fine, Zachary McCauley, Jerry Siegel, Chuck Hemard, Patrick Owens, Michael Meads, Marion “Pinky” Bass, Devin Lunsford, Celestia Morgan, Jared Ragland. THE MOBILE DELTA: GLASS & LIGHT March 10, 2017 - June 17, 2018 Rene Culler’s site-specic work is a mural in glass that celebrates the species-rich Delta and its atmospheric qualities. The Delta is a changeling environment which is constantly shaped and molded by the weather and waterways. As the grasses, almost transparent, catch the light, Culler’s drawings and painting in glass suggest the landscape that southern Alabama holds so dear. The composition is a wall of natural light utilized as a glass canvas for drawing, painting and printing with vitreous enamels. Slumped dimensional panels and blown glass abstractly portray the location’s dimensionality. OFFSITE EXHIBITIONS POP-UP MUSEUM FOR MOBILE: Faces in Art & Face to Face: Ceramics and Glass from the Collection May 22, 2017 – April 29, 2018 This window front exhibition in downtown Mobile located at 300 Dauphin Street includes glass from the Mobile Museum of Art permanent collection. Half of the exhibition can be seen from the street during all hours of the day, while the rest can be viewed inside during the Central Parking ofce’s regular business hours. Art from MMofA in the Mobile Regional Airport April 18, 2014 – ongoing Included in many renovation efforts, the Mobile Regional Airport secured a loan from the Mobile Museum of Art, to be displayed along its concourse. This loan was selected from MMofA’s collection of sculptural works, including the museum’s Haverty collection of international studio glass. 4 WHAT WE DO RESEARCH & PUBLICATIONS CHRISTENBERRY: In Alabama - A Tribute This limited edition publication was produced in conjunction with the exhibition, Christenberry: In Alabama (March 10 - July 9, 2017), organized by the Mobile Museum of Art, Mobile, Alabama on the occasion of the state’s bicentennial celebration. The exhibition is generously underwritten by a grant from the Crampton Trust, with additional support from the City of Mobile. The publication was made possible by grants from the Alabama State Council on the Arts and the National Endowment for the Arts. Cover and sign images by Greg Staley; designed by Phillip Collier Design Studio and printed by MPress Printing, New Orleans, Louisiana. GIFTS & ACQUISITIONS WORKS ON PAPER WOOD Gifts of Erna Mayer (3 gifts) Gifts of Ronald S. Payne (2 gifts) William A. Christenberry, Sr. American, 1912 – 2001 STRAIGHT RAZOR 1992 Carved wood and metal Thomas P. Kausel Thomas P. Kausel Thomas P. Kausel German, born 1937 German, born 1937 German, born 1937 ORANGE RED BLUE 2013 2013 2013 Silkscreen on paper Silkscreen on paper Silkscreen on paper William A. Christenberry, Sr. Gift of Katja Oxman (1 gift) American, 1912 – 2001 FOLDING KNIFE Katja Oxman 1992 American, born Germany, 1942 Carved wood and metal MOST PRACTICED DISTANCE 1990 Aquatint on paper Gift of the Artist 5 WHAT WE DO GIFTS & ACQUISITIONS (continued) WORKS ON PAPER The Museum Project (35 gifts) Robert E.