50th Anniversary
50 Years : 50 Stories
Presented weekly in the Director’s backstory blog, fifty stories will recount the history of the Museum from its founding on the Purchase College, SUNY, campus in 1969 to the present day. Each story plays an important role in honoring our past, celebrating our present, and preparing the NEU to move boldly forward into its next 50 years.
This week's featured backstory:
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backstory50: Full Circle
As we enter our last month of the 50th anniversary backstories, I find myself shifting from a celebration of the Museum’s rich and robust history to focus on its promising future.
More Stories from the Archives
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backstory50: So, I won’t quit my day job …
A poem ...
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backstory50: Scholarship
Over the last 50 years, the Neuberger has produced many, many catalogues featuring groundbreaking scholarship related to our special exhibitions.
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backstory50: Front of House
So, you walk into the Neuberger and then what happens? Our Visitor Services and Security team are right there, to welcome you, and to make sure that your visit is safe and comfortable.
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backstory50: Lessons
Many, many years ago, I had an intern who was just so smart. She was creative, thoughtful, and had wonderful ideas. But she wasn’t so good at listening.
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backstory50: Vote
Vote
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backstory50: Our work with kids
Nearby the Neuberger is the Purchase College Children’s Center, which both of my kids attended. Periodically, teachers will bring the children by to explore our exhibitions.
Our connection to kids is core to our mission as an academic museum. -
backstory50: Save the date for our next Yaseen Lecture
I wrote to you in April about Helen and Leonard Yaseen, former residents of Larchmont who were among the inaugural members of the Board of the Friends of the Neuberger Museum of Art.
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backstory50: Richard Pettibone Paints the Rickey Collection
Today, I reached into the archives to find one of my first backstory blog posts written in January 2019 when we were installing Miniaturizing Modernism: Richard Pettibone Paints the Rickey Collection.
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backstory50: Activating Our Cultural Legacies
One of the transformational relationships we have built over the last several years has been with The Andrew W. Mellon Foundation, which saw the need for the Neuberger to be able to document and preserve its own history.
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backstory50: Transformative Giving
Endowments both enrich and transform the trajectory of a museum, providing financial support for things such as new acquisitions, updated technology, and even the hiring and longevity of staff positions.
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backstory50: Fluxus
Following last week’s backstory50 about Yoko Ono’s Mend Piece iterations and her role in Fluxus, performance, and instruction art, this week’s backstory50 highlights the Neuberger’s 1983 exhibition Fluxus, etc.: The Gilbert and Lila Silverman Collection and the FLUXFEST that was held in tandem with it. Read more here.
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backstory50: Participatory Art
At the Neuberger we like to produce exhibition projects where everyone can participate in the art making.
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backstory50: Welded!
The beautiful thing about art is that it communicates, in one way or another, with its setting–whether it be inside the white-cube gallery of a museum, or within a grassy patch of a bustling park.
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backstory50: Constructivist Art at the NEU
When The Making of a Museum exhibition opened in 1974, Roy R. Neuberger’s modern art collection was the largest of five groups of art represented in the show. Hans Richters’ collection of Dada art, which we wrote about a few weeks ago was a second. Today, Curatorial Assistant Rem Ribeiro is helping me introduce a third: the George and Edith Rickey Collection of Constructivist Art.
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backstory50: Featured Partnership: Neuberger Berman
In the 1950s, few outside the museum world could imagine going to the office every day and being surrounded by the work of some of the world’s most well-known—and emerging—contemporary artists. Unless, of course, you happened to have worked at Neuberger Berman.
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backstory50: Firsts
In January of 2022 I wrote to you about Faith Ringgold’s mural-size painting entitled For the Women’s House (1971), painted for the women then incarcerated on Rikers Island. The work was the final piece created for American People, a series of paintings—her first, actually—created between 1963 and 1971.
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backstory50: The largest Edward Hopper
It’s true. Barber Shop (1931) is the largest work Edward Hopper ever painted.
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backstory50: Happy Birthday, Roy!
This past Sunday, July 21, was the 121st anniversary of Roy R. Neuberger’s birthday. This week it seems fitting to focus on one of the most wonderful sets of objects in the Neuberger’s collection, what we lovingly call the “Birthday Books.”
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backstory50: Catlett x 2
So, right now we have a work on view that is in two places at one time—Elizabeth Catlett’s study Homage to Black Women Poets (1984). OK, it’s not really visible in two places, but the object is a part of both The Making of a Museum: 50 Years and Reflection / Refraction … although it’s only physically on view in the latter.
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backstory50: In the public eye
Do you remember these hammocks? I do. Laura Anderson Barbata’s Nuestra historia no se encuentra en un libro [Our history Is Not Found in a Book] was one of the first outdoor sculpture projects I saw when I arrived on the Purchase College campus many years ago. I didn’t realize immediately that it was a sculpture project... which is one of the most interesting things to me about public art in general.
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backstory50: Artist as Curator
Many years ago, when I was Chief Curator at the Neuberger, I was thinking about putting together an exhibition of the work of Forrest Bess. We have a wonderful painting of his work in our collection entitled Before Man, which was purchased by Roy R. Neuberger from the Betty Parsons Gallery in 1978 and donated to the Neuberger in 1986.
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backstory50: Creative aging
Last year the Neuberger Museum of Art initiated the NEU Vitality Art Workshops, a series of programs for members of our community who are over the age of 55.
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backstory50: Juneteenth
All this year these backstory messages have focused on the celebration of the Museum’s 50th anniversary, focusing on today through the lens of the past.
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backstory50: Nevelson at Purchase, 1977
Do you recognize this sculpture, being craned into place for the Neuberger’s 1977 Louise Nevelson exhibition? You may if you’ve spent time across the street from Purchase College at the Donald M. Kendall Sculpture Gardens at PepsiCo.
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backstory50: Dada Art at the NEU
The extraordinary depth and quality of the objects that Roy R. Neuberger donated to the Museum over the course of his lifetime can overshadow some of the other extraordinary areas of the Museum’s collection. One of those areas is the Hans Richter Collection of Dada Art.
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backstory50: Training the next generation
The Neuberger Museum of Art has always trained students in curatorial practice and the student-curated exhibition has long been a hallmark of that training.
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backstory50: The Museum as Classroom
In my Ph.D. program in art history at Rutgers I had an unexpected experience. Part of my funding required that I serve as a teaching assistant and, to my great surprise, I found that I loved being in the classroom. Eventually, teaching my own classes but still intent on continuing my museum career that was already a decade-long prior to grad school, I came to understand the ways in which museums could function as classrooms.
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backstory50: 1974 Inaugural Exhibition
Fifty years ago this week, the Neuberger Museum of Art opened its doors to the public with its very first exhibition, The Making of a Museum.
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backstory50: Robert Indiana’s “Art” (fronted by a follow-up about uric acid)
So, last week’s backstory50 got a LOT of raised eyebrows.
I kind of thought it might.
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backstory50: Here’s why we moved the Henry Moore
Yeah… we moved it.
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backstory50: A collection in service to others
On June 19, 1960, a critic for The New York Times wrote, “No private collection in this country, or for that matter anywhere, has been more generously put into service of the public than that of Mr. and Mrs. Roy R. Neuberger.”
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backstory50: Dismantling the “Van Gogh Effect”
This is a story best told by Roy R. Neuberger in his own words (excerpted from The Passionate Collector):
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backstory50: The Yaseen Lectures
As we prepare to host the first of the Museum’s 50th anniversary celebratory social events this weekend, I’ve been reflecting about the incredible legacies that were established by some of our founding members. -
backstory50: Transformational Giving
Today, I want to tell you about one of the Neuberger Museum of Art’s greatest supporters, the Straus family.
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backstory50: The biggest gallery around
I hope you will all be joining us next month for our 50th anniversary celebration events. When we gather in the Theater Gallery on Saturday evening, April 13, to honor Janet Langsam, Fred Wilson, and Lois Bregstein, surrounded by the site-specific painting, Threnody, we will be in one of the largest exhibitions spaces in the region.
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backstory50: Rethinking our objects from Africa
Objects from Africa have been on view at the Neuberger Museum of Art since it opened to the public in 1974.
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backstory50: On display at the Museum of Modern Art
This is one of my favorite stories because it connects our campus to another great institution, the Museum of Modern Art in New York City.
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backstory50: The Museum Service Council
Another of the Neuberger’s great support organizations is the Museum Service Council. The MSC is comprised of devoted art lovers who have volunteered hours and hours of their time to the education of generations of students—from the College and from the community—who have walked through the doors of the Museum.
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backstory50: The Friends of the Neuberger Museum of Art
One the best things about the Neuberger Museum of Art are the people who make up our community. And among the ‘best of the best’ are the leaders who have, for so long now, been a part of our amazing support and advisory group, the Friends of the Neuberger Museum of Art.
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backstory50: Threnody
Opening today, Cleve Gray’s Threnody is on view again as part of the Museum’s 50th anniversary celebration.
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backstory50: Happy Valentine’s Day!
Today’s story is your story to tell.
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backstory50: Building a Museum collection
A few weeks ago, I wrote about Roy R. Neuberger’s 1969 founding promised gift. Twenty-nine objects were accessioned by the Neuberger Museum of Art in that year. Since then, the Museum’s collection has grown to comprise nearly 7,000 objects, which have been donated, promised, bequeathed, and purchased.
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backstory50: Building a Museum
No, it’s not shiny, or fancy, or visible from the road. But that’s not what it was supposed to be.
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backstory50: The Academical Village
The master plan for Purchase College was inspired by Thomas Jefferson’s master plan for the University of Virginia in Charlottesville.
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backstory50: The Passionate Collector
In 2002, as Roy R. Neuberger turned 100, he published his second memoir, The Passionate Collector: Eighty Years in the World of Art. He dedicated the book “with great affection and respect to the extraordinary, original, passionate artists who have enriched my life beyond measure.”
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backstory50: The Promised Gift
Do you know which work of art was the very first to enter the Museum’s collection?
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backstory50: Happy and Happy
2024. A great year. Why? Because the Neuberger Museum of Art is celebrating its 50th anniversary!
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backstory: Celebrate with us!
Between your other festive holiday happenings, take a minute to mark your calendars for some of the special events that we’ll be hosting at the Museum during our Year of Celebration!
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backstory: Our 50th Anniversary
You’ve heard me mention that all year next year the Neuberger will be celebrating our 50th anniversary.
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backstory: November 19 and the Friends
You’ve heard me mention that next year we’ll be celebrating the 50th anniversary of the Museum. This milestone wouldn’t be possible without the support of the Friends of the Neuberger Museum of Art. It’s true. We wouldn’t be one of the top academic art museums in the country without the Friends organization.
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backstory: Groundbreaking
This Friday, October 6, marks the 54th anniversary of the groundbreaking for the museum.
Programs and Events
Friends, neighbors, and guests from around the globe are invited to celebrate with us during a year-long schedule of artist talks, lectures, and other programming.
Exhibitions
Inspired by our first exhibition in 1974, the Museum’s galleries will be filled with commemorative, multimedia experiences illustrating important moments from our history, highlighting objects from our collection, and showcasing materials from our vast archives.
The Making of a Museum Exhibitions
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The Making of a Museum: 50 Years
On View
January 24 - December 22, 2024
For fifty years, the Neuberger Museum of Art has fostered learning, sparked the creative process, and investigated understandings of the world in which we live through its collections, exhibitions, and education programs. -
The Promised Gift
On View
January 24, 2024
West Gallery
A project in The Making of a Museum: 50 Years exhibition
The Promised Gift tells the story of Roy R. Neuberger’s 1969 grand and optimistic philanthropic contribution, a gift of 300 works of art to the State University of New York. -
1969—1974
On View
January 24, 2024
Klein Gallery
A project in The Making of a Museum: 50 Years exhibition
1969—1974 explores the role of Roy R. Neuberger as one of the most important collectors of his day, the conceptualization, design, and construction of the Museum, and its use in the early 1970s by the students and faculty of Purchase College prior to the formal opening of the Neuberger Museum of Art in 1974. -
1974—2024
On View
April 13, 2024
South Gallery
A project in The Making of a Museum: 50 Years exhibition
1974—2024 tells the story of the years from the time of the formal opening of the Museum to the present. -
Threnody
ON VIEW: February 21 - August 4, 2024
Theater Gallery
A project in The Making of a Museum: 50 Years exhibition
Threnody is a 250-foot-wide site-specific painting created by American artist Cleve Gray for the opening of the Neuberger Museum of Art.
Generous financial support for The Making of a Museum: 50 Years exhibition has been provided by ArtsWestchester, with funding made possible by Westchester County government with the support of County Executive George Latimer; the Purchase College Foundation; and the Friends of the Neuberger Museum of Art.
Additional support for Neuberger Museum of Art exhibitions and programs has been provided by the New York State Council on the Arts with the support of the Office of the Governor and the New York State Legislature.