Virginia Museum of Fine Arts gifted collection of nearly 2,000 photographs

VMFA received a gift of 1,986 photographs from Joy of Giving Something Inc. The donation includes works by more than 450 artists and nearly 200 photographic series from the 19th, 20th, and 21st centuries. Many works come from the collection assembled by Howard Stein, who began acquiring photographs in the 1980s and founded JGS in 1998 to support photography and arts education. Highlights include works by Charles Marville, Eugène Atget, and Nadar, rare daguerreotypes by Joseph-Philibert Girault de Prangey, and prints by Gustave Le Gray. The gift also contains vernacular photographs and cased 19th-century objects, modernist photographers such as Alfred Stieglitz, Dora Maar, László Moholy-Nagy, and Man Ray, and documentary and photojournalistic figures including Berenice Abbott, Walker Evans, Dorothea Lange, and others. Contemporary artists represented include Adam Fuss, David Goldblatt, Gilles Peress, and Rosalind Fox Solomon. VMFA previously received portfolios in 2023, and a grant supports cataloguing and storage. Works from the gift will feature prominently in new photography galleries opening in 2027.

"The Virginia Museum of Fine Arts (VMFA) has received a gift of 1,986 photographs from Joy of Giving Something Inc (JGS), a nonprofit organisation founded by Howard and Janet Stein. The donation includes works by more than 450 artists and nearly 200 photographic series from the 19th, 20th and 21st centuries. The donated works largely come from the collection assembled by Howard Stein (1926-2011), a financier who began acquiring photographs in the 1980s and established JGS in 1998 to support photography and arts education initiatives."

"Among the highlights of the gift are works by Charles Marville, Eugène Atget and Nadar, as well as rare daguerreotypes by Joseph-Philibert Girault de Prangey and prints by Gustave Le Gray. The donation also includes nearly 200 vernacular photographs and cased objects from the 19th century. Additionally, the gift includes works by the Modernist photographers Alfred Stieglitz, Dora Maar, László Moholy-Nagy and Man Ray, as well as images by the photojournalists and documentarians Berenice Abbott, Walker Evans, Dorothea Lange, Leonard Freed, Marc Riboud, Mary Ellen Mark and Margaret Bourke-White."

"The VMFA received a group of photographic portfolios and series from JGS in 2023, including Paul Strand's Photographs of Mexico (1940) and Larry Clark's Tulsa (1971). Following that transfer, the JGS's board elected to donate the vast majority of the foundation's remaining collection to the museum. The museum also received a grant to support the work required to catalogue and store the gifted works."

"According to the VMFA, works from the JGS gift will feature prominently in the museum's new photography galleries, which are scheduled to open in 2027 as part of the institution's ongoing expansion and reno"

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