ASHEVILLE, NC - The Asheville Art Museum announces it has been awarded a Save America’s Treasures grantby the National Park Service, in partnership with the Institute of Museum and Library Services, the National Endowment of the Humanities, and the National Endowment for the Arts.
The award of $196,935 will be used to support the conservation of the Museum's Black Mountain College Collection. This nationally and internationally significant collection features historical materials and creative works by students and teacherswhoattended Black Mountain College during its operation from 1933 to 1957.
“Through these competitive matching grants, the National Park Service and our federal, state, tribal, local government and nonprofit partners are helping communities preserve some of our nation’s most important historic places and collections,” said National Park Service Deputy Director P. Daniel Smith. "By doing so we are saving these sites and stories for future generations.”
BMC opened its doors during a politically and economically volatile time in American and European history and became one of the most noteworthy experiments in the history of American art and education. BMC attracted some of the most influential artists of the 20th centuryincluding Josef and Anni Albers, Willem and Elaine de Kooning, Robert Rauschenberg, RuthAsawa, Cy Twombly, Buckminster Fuller,and many more.
The Museum's goals for this project include:
1) Restoringthe physical integrity of endangered BMC materials through conservation
2) Stabilizingand preserve the BMC Collection for future exhibitions and research
3) Increasingpublic understanding and accessibility through digitization and exhibitions
