Southern art gets a place to call home

The largest and most comprehensive collection of Southern American art has found a permanent showcase in the new Ogden Museum of Southern Art's Goldring Hall, the first building of a museum art complex that will be completed in the fall of 2004.

The hall, named for late museum chairman and beverage magnate William Goldring, opened this summer with an exhibit, "The Story of the South: Art and Culture 1890-2003," drawing on a collection of 2,750 works. The museum is part of the University of New Orleans and is located in the Lee Circle area of New Orleans' warehouse district, once dilapidated but now being revitalized as residential and business area with several arts venues.

"With the opening of the museum, we have a place to study the distinct flavor and soul of Southern work and trace its legacy, exploring the visual influence of the South on American culture," said J. Richard Gruber, museum director. "It is time to advance and expand efforts to integrate the best of Southern art and the best of national and international art."

The museum's collection was established in 1994 by a gift from Louisiana businessman Roger H. Ogden of 1,200 works by Southern artists. He began collecting 40 years ago when his parents gave him "Blue Lagoon," a painting by Louisiana Impressionist Alexander Drysdale, while he was still in college. His gift to the museum has since been augmented by donations from across the nation.

The collection is representative of the work of 18th to 21st century artists from 15 southern states and the District of Columbia. In addition to paintings and sculpture, it includes prints, photographs, ceramics, glass, and various crafts. While awaiting the completion of the new hall, the collection supplied material for 26 exhibitions at a nearby temporary location.

The handsome five-story glass and stone Goldring Hall is notable for a four-story atrium lobby with beautifully textured stone walls and a floating staircase that leads to 47,000 square feet of gallery space for the permanent collection and rotating exhibitions. Also on site are a center for craft and design, a museum store, administrative offices, and a roof terrace with views of the city. The use of stone harmonizes with the exterior stonework of an adjoining 19th century library that will be a part of the museum complex.

Goldring Hall was designed by the New Orleans architectural firm of Errol Barron/Michael Toups, which is currently completing the museum complex by restoring the adjoining library building on Lee Circle, designed by Lousiana-born Boston architect H. H. Richardson, and building a new wing. The Patrick F. Taylor Library will display the museum's 18th and 19th century art, and the Clementine Hunter Wing will house its educational facilities.

The art collection contains only the work of artists deemed Southern by birth, residence, or by the theme of their art, including European artists who painted Southern subject matter. Many of the artists were professionally trained but there is outstanding work by untrained artists, generally known today as "outsider" artists. The collection spans nearly 300 years but is rich in contemporary art.

Among the notable artists represented are George Ohr Jr., the so-called "Mad Potter of Biloxi" noted for his distinctive art pottery, New Orleans-born Fritz Bultman who was an important member of New York's Abstract Expressionist circle, George Andrews, a self-taught Georgia painter whose pointillist technique earned him the nickname "The Dot Man," and Ernest Bellocq, the Creole photographer who recorded life in the Storyville red light district in New Orleans.

Others are Bessie Harvey, a Georgia-born sculptor who used found wood as the material for her work; renowned collage artist Arless Day of Sarasota, Fla.; Clementine Hunter, whose "memory paintings" of rural Louisiana life have been compared to Grandma Moses' art; figurative glass artist Richard Jolley of Knoxville, Tenn., and Texan Jesus Bautista Moroles, noted for his complex geometric shapes in stone.

The Ogden Museum, the first Smithsonian Institution affiliate in Louisiana, is not the only museum in the Warehouse District. The Contemporary Arts Center is across the street, and the D-Day Museum and Louisiana Children's Museum are in immediate proximity. Gruber said he expects the Ogden to attract 200,000 visitors a year, including many from the nearby Morial Convention Center, when the museum complex is completed.