The study of American visual culture at Oxford has received a significant boost thanks to two generous commitments from the Terra Foundation for American Art, a long-term supporter of the University.
The foundation has agreed to a loan of 37 artworks from the Terra Foundation Collection and the award of a major grant to the Ashmolean Museum, as well as an extension to funding for an important academic post in the History of Art Department.
The Terra Foundation for American Art Visiting Professorship
Since 2016 the Terra Foundation has funded an annual visiting professorship at Oxford to promote the study of American art from a global perspective. Each visiting professor offers graduate and undergraduate courses in American art, delivers an annual public lecture series, organises a scholarly symposium, and engages in research on the visual and material culture of the United States.
The Terra Foundation has now generously agreed to extend its support for the post for a further two years (2023/24 and 2024/25) with a grant of $397,000. This latest gift brings the foundation’s support for the Terra Foundation for American Art Visiting Professorship to over $1.4 million.
Professor Geoffrey Batchen, Head of the History of Art Department, says: ‘The extension of the Terra Foundation for American Art Visiting Professorship provides an invaluable opportunity to build on long-term research networks, encourage international collaboration, and inspire a new generation of American art academics and curators by further embedding the subject into Oxford’s research communities and its graduate and undergraduate curricula.’
Professor Geraldine Johnson, Associate Professor in the History of Art, says: ‘The Terra Foundation’s support of scholarship, teaching and curatorial practices that challenge traditional narratives of American art complements the department’s own commitment to rethinking the material, geographic and intellectual parameters of the discipline of art history.’
Christopher Reed, Professor of English and Visual Culture at Pennsylvania State University, was recently appointed to the visiting professorship for the 2022/23 academic year. His scholarship and teaching engage with a wide range of art and design, but focus particularly on the social significance of visual expression and experience. While at Oxford Professor Reed’s research will examine the impact that travel and expatriate experience have had on American understandings of American-ness.
Bolstering the Ashmolean Museum’s American art collection
In addition to its generous support for the visiting professorship, the Terra Foundation has also awarded a grant of $100,000 and agreed to a loan of 37 prints of American art to the Ashmolean Museum through its Terra Collection in Residence initiative. The foundation’s long-term loan of Autumn Afternoon, the Wissahickon by Thomas Moran has also been extended until 2026. The loaned works, which encompass a wide range of techniques and artistic practices, will add significant value to the museum’s own holdings of American art, as well as to American art historical teaching, learning and research at the University.
Among the 37 items being loaned is a 1942 lithograph of Bleecker Street by Kyra Markham (shown above), showing children cooling off by playing in water from a fire hydrant on a hot summer’s day in Greenwich Village, Manhattan. Other loans include coloured drypoint and aquatint prints by Mary Cassatt, etchings by Edward Hopper, and a range of colour woodcuts by Arthur Dow, Helen Hyde and Bertha Lum. The collection will particularly enhance the University’s contribution to conversations around issues of gender, race and politics, as well as offering insights into the work of women artists.
The cost of curating and conserving the works will be supported by the accompanying grant, which will also enable the creation of related teaching materials and the development of a public engagement programme at the museum. The grant brings the Terra Foundation’s total support for the Ashmolean since 2018 to $500,000.
Dr Jim Harris, Teaching Curator at the Ashmolean Museum, said: ‘This generous loan from the Terra Foundation Collection is an outstanding resource for scholars, students and researchers focused on American art and will serve as a key focus for interdisciplinary dialogue. Its incorporation into University teaching will help ensure that the Ashmolean continues to provide intellectual leadership and play a vital role in extending and diversifying the Oxford curriculum.’
Reshaping the story of American art
The Terra Foundation of American Art was established in 1978, and its renewed directions foster intercultural dialogues and encourage transformative practices to expand narratives of American art. Its grant programme, art collection and initiatives support visual art projects engaged in reshaping how the story of American art is told.
Sharon Corwin, President and CEO of Terra Foundation for American Art, said: ‘It is important that the work we do continues to encourage stories that are reflective of the multiplicity and complexity of American art history. Our newly launched Terra Collection in Residence initiative—partnering with university museums worldwide, with the Ashmolean Museum being one of the first—invites museums to expand the stories they tell with their collections. Loans from the foundation’s collection are intended to provide opportunities for interdisciplinary research and teaching with American art and encourage the presentation of new contents, voices, and practices.’