The UCA Art Collection home page has a new feature that highlights the university’s artwork.
“Featured Item” showcases a piece from the collection each quarter. The first featured artwork was a bowl from the historic artifacts donated to the UCA Foundation, Inc. by alumni Dr. and Mrs. Earl B. Riddick. A painting by Dorris Curtis, Winding the Maypole, is the current featured artwork. The piece was bequeathed to the UCA Foundation by the artist.
Officials redesigned the website earlier this year to help the community become more aware of the university’s art collection .The home page provides easy access to main categories of objects in the collection. The site also outlines how to donate to the collection and how to initiate a gift of art work or funds to purchase items for the collection, its maintenance and preservation.
“We’re delighted to have a place where the public can easily find information about UCA’s artwork as well as how to donate funds and artwork to benefit the collection,” Barbara Satterfield, director of the Baum Gallery of Fine Art.
UCA is fortunate to have received donations of paintings, drawings and prints by Adrian Brewer and Louis Freund–both historic, regionally-known professional artists with significant web notations and inclusion in prestigious collections, she said. Public art commissions, such as Song of the Earth by sculptor Tom Gibbs, lend a significant cache to the collection as well.
“UCA has been the fortunate recipient of a number of prestigious works,” Satterfield added. “The web site is the place to discover them and to learn about how UCA will be a good steward of those artworks over time.”
The collection is managed by the UCA Public Art Committee. The committee is presently working on identifying “100 Hatfields” — selecting significant works from the many paintings from the Hatfield Collection currently on view across the campus — so time and resources can be dedicated to their preservation.
UCA has promoted the arts since 1907, when it created a department of art as one of its nine original academic departments. Since then, the university has had a significant impact on the visual and cultural heritage of Faulkner County and the state of Arkansas.
Visit the UCA Art Collection website at http://www.uca.edu/artcollection.