The Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco (FAMSF), comprising the de Young Museum in Golden Gate Park and the Legion of Honor in Lincoln Park, is the largest public arts institution in the city of San Francisco. FAMSF's combined attendance was 1,158,264 visitors in 2022, making it the fifth most attended art institution in the United States. [1]
Opened in 1895, the de Young is home to American art from the 17th century through today, textile arts and costumes, African art, Oceanic art, arts of the Americas, and contemporary art. Opened in 1924, the Legion of Honor showcases European painting, sculpture, and decorative arts, ancient art, graphic arts, and contemporary art in dialogue with its historical collections and Beaux-Arts style building. [2] In total the collection holds 130,000 objects. [3]
In 1931, the two museums were informally united for the first time when Lloyd LaPage Rollins took over the directorship of the Legion of Honor and was simultaneously appointed the first director of the de Young. In 1972, under the leadership of Ian McKibbin White, the two museums were formally merged to create the Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco (FAMSF). At that time, the permanent collections were reorganized and distinct curatorial departments were created. [4]
● 1924-1930: Cornelia B. Sage Quinton (Legion of Honor) ● 1931-1933: Lloyd LaPage Rollins (Legion of Honor and de Young) ● 1933-1939: Dr. Walter Heil (Legion of Honor) ● 1939-1961: Dr. Walter Heil (de Young) ● 1939 -1968: Thomas Carr Howe (Legion of Honor) ● 1970-1987: Ian Mckibbin White (FAMSF) [5] ● 1987-2005: Harry S. Parker ● 2006-2011: John E. Buchanan ● 2013-2015: Colin. B Bailey ● 2016-2018: Max Hollein ● 2018 – Present: Thomas P. Campbell [6]
de Young Museum Main article: de Young Museum [7] [ circular reference ]
The de Young originated from the 1894 California Midwinter International Exposition and was established as the Memorial Museum. Thirty years later, it was renamed in honor of Michael H. de Young, a longtime champion of the museum. The present copper-clad landmark building, designed by Herzog and de Meuron, opened in October 2005. Walter Hood was commissioned to design the landscaping and garden courts for the new building.
Legion of Honor Main article: Legion of Honor
The Legion of Honor was inspired by the French pavilion, a replica of the Palais de la Légion d’Honneur in Paris, at San Francisco's Panama-Pacific International Exposition [8] [ circular reference ] of 1915. The museum opened in 1924 in the Beaux Arts–style building designed by George Applegarth on a bluff overlooking the Golden Gate. In 1995, the Legion of Honor opened an expansion designed by architects Edward Larrabee Barnes and Mark Cavagnero. It increased the museum's square footage by 42 percent, including the addition of seven additional special exhibition galleries.
In early 2018, a group of staff members formed the IDEA Committee, to advocate for inclusion, diversity, equity and access to be considered in the 5 areas: staff, public programs, exhibitions, collections, and visitors. [9] In June 2020, the Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco (FAMSF) took a public stance in solidarity with Black Lives Matter, and in November 2020, the institution revised its strategic plan to focus and center DEIA initiatives. In taking this action, FAMSF actively began to shift toward becoming an anti-racist organization.
Since January 2021, FAMSF has made progress in shifting hiring practices and increased the number of BIPOC staff. In doing so, the Museums realized that it needed to address the career pipeline for underrepresented groups. To overcome this barrier to diversity and equity, the Museums created four two-year fellowship positions and eight full-time paid summer internships.
In 2022, the Museums have Increased the number of staff under the age of 30 and over the age of 50 by 9 percent, as well as increased the number of BIPOC staff by 18 percent. [10]
The Legion of Honor, formally known as the California Palace of the Legion of Honor, is an art museum in San Francisco, California. Located in Lincoln Park, the Legion of Honor is a component of the Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco, which also administers the de Young Museum.
The Panama–Pacific International Exposition was a world's fair held in San Francisco, California, United States, from February 20 to December 4, 1915. Its stated purpose was to celebrate the completion of the Panama Canal, but it was widely seen in the city as an opportunity to showcase its recovery from the 1906 earthquake. The fair was constructed on a 636 acre(1 sq. mi., 2.6 km2) site along the northern shore, between the Presidio and Fort Mason, now known as the Marina District.
Charles Cottet was a French painter, born at Le Puy-en-Velay and died in Paris. A famed post-impressionist, Cottet is known for his dark, evocative painting of rural Brittany and seascapes. He led a school of painters known as the Bande noire or "Nubians" group, and was friends with such artists as Auguste Rodin.
The de Young Museum, formally the M. H. de Young Memorial Museum, is a fine arts museum located in San Francisco, California. Located in Golden Gate Park, it is a component of the Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco, along with the Legion of Honor. The de Young is named for early San Francisco newspaperman M. H. de Young.
Arthur F. Mathews was an American Tonalist painter who was one of the founders of the American Arts and Crafts Movement. Trained as an architect and artist, he and his wife Lucia Kleinhans Mathews had a significant effect on the evolution of Californian art in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. His students include Granville Redmond, Xavier Martinez, Armin Hansen, Percy Gray, Gottardo Piazzoni, Ralph Stackpole, Mary Colter, Maynard Dixon, Rinaldo Cuneo and Francis McComas.
Bouquets to Art is an annual floral exhibition hosted by the De Young Museum of Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco. Florists, designers and garden clubs are invited to present floral interpretations of works in the museum's permanent collections, and the floral displays are presented in juxtaposition with the works that inspired them.
Alma de Bretteville Spreckels was a wealthy socialite and philanthropist in San Francisco, California. She was known both as "Big Alma" and "The Great Grandmother of San Francisco". Among her many accomplishments, she persuaded her first husband, sugar magnate Adolph B. Spreckels, to donate the California Palace of the Legion of Honor to the city of San Francisco.
Thomas Patrick Campbell is the director and CEO of the Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco, overseeing the de Young and Legion of Honor museums. He served as the director and CEO of the Metropolitan Museum of Art between 2009 and 2017. On 30 June 2017, Campbell stepped down as director and CEO of the Metropolitan Museum of Art under pressure and accepted the Getty Foundation's Rothschild Fellowship for research and study at both the J. Paul Getty Museum in Los Angeles and at Waddesdon Manor, in the UK.
Art in Action was an exhibit of artists at work displayed for four months in the summer of 1940 at the Golden Gate International Exposition (GGIE) held on Treasure Island. Many famous artists took part in the exhibit, including Dudley C. Carter, woodcarver and Diego Rivera, muralist. Rivera painted his monumental work Pan American Unity at Art in Action.
The San Francisco Art Association (SFAA) was an organization that promoted California artists, held art exhibitions, published a periodical, and established the first art school west of Chicago. The SFAA – which, by 1961, completed a long sequence of mission shifts and re-namings to become the San Francisco Art Institute – was the predecessor of the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art. Over its lifetime, the association helped establish a Northern California regional flavor of California Tonalism as differentiated from Southern California American Impressionism.
William Seltzer Rice was an American woodblock print artist, art educator and author, associated with the Arts and Crafts movement in Northern California.
Arthur Putnam was an American sculptor and animalier who was recognized for his bronze sculptures of wild animals. Some of his artworks are public monuments. He was a well-known figure, both statewide and nationally, during the time he lived in California. Putnam was regarded as an artistic genius in San Francisco and his life was chronicled in the San Francisco and East Bay newspapers. He won a gold medal at the 1915 San Francisco world's fair, officially known as the Panama–Pacific International Exposition, and was responsible for large sculptural works that stand in San Francisco and San Diego. Putnam exhibited at the Armory Show in 1913, and his works were also exhibited in New York, Philadelphia, Chicago, Paris, and Rome.
Suzanne Scheuer was an American fine artist, best known for her New Deal-era murals. She painted one of the murals in Coit Tower, Newsgathering.
Herman Armour Webster was an American artist.
George Albert Harris, also known as George Harris (1913–1991), was an American painter, muralist, lithographer, and educator. He was a participant in the WPA Federal Art Project and was among the youngest artists on the mural project at Coit Tower. Harris' style is California Modernism, often working in abstraction, focusing primarily on still lifes and portraits.
Robert Boardman Howard (1896–1983), was a prominent American artist active in Northern California in the first half of the twentieth century. He is also known as Robert Howard, Robert B. Howard and Bob Howard. Howard was celebrated for his graphic art, watercolors, oils, and murals, as well as his Art Deco bas-reliefs and his Modernist sculptures and mobiles.
Charles Stafford Duncan (1892–1952) was a San Francisco painter and lithographer perhaps best known for his mural in the Paramount Theatre in Oakland, California. He won the Benjamin Altman Prize from the National Academy of Design in 1937.
Richard Benefield is executive director of the George Rickey Foundation, Inc., as well as an independent consultant to museums and educational organizations including the Heard Museum, University of Arizona, and Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco. He previously held director positions at The David Hockney Foundation, the Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco, The Walt Disney Family Museum, and Harvard University Art Museums.
Elizabeth Sawyer Norton (1887–1985) was an American artist, known for her bronze sculptures, paintings, and printmaking. The subject of her work often featured animals, landscapes and/or portraits. She lived in Palo Alto, California, from 1919 until her death in 1985.
Saint John the Baptist is an oil on canvas painting executed between 1597 and 1607 by the Greek artist El Greco whilst living in Spain. It is in the collection of the Legion of Honor museum, a component part of the Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco.