HOME PLACES & BEYOND

In the last issue of Catalyst, the Brandywine shared news about an exciting new partnership with the Wyeth Foundation for American Art and the subsequent hiring of William L. Coleman, Ph.D.—the Museum’s inaugural Wyeth Foundation Curator and Director of the Andrew & Betsy Wyeth Study Center. Coleman recently curated Andrew Wyeth: Home Places at the Brandywine—the first exhibition to result from this partnership, which features many works that have never before been exhibited. In the article below, Coleman shares a sneak peek into his new role and some of the key projects on the horizon.

The current exhibition Andrew Wyeth: Home Places marks the start of an exciting new era for the Brandywine, with many more projects to come exploring untold stories and unseen objects from the treasure trove that is the Andrew & Betsy Wyeth Collection. It has been an incredible privilege to start delving into the more than 7,000 Andrew Wyeth artworks—collected and documented by his essential creative partner, Betsy James Wyeth—to build this show, which I hope you’ll come see for yourself before it closes on July 16, 2023. Now that this vast collection has been placed under the management of the Brandywine, visitors can expect to see regular exhibitions drawn from this trove that share new insight into one of the most important legacies in American art.

These collection exhibitions will be curated by the staff of the Brandywine’s Wyeth Study Center: a new division that encompasses our two physical research offices in Chadds Ford, PA and the satellite Brandywine office on the campus of the Farnsworth Art Museum in Rockland, Maine—that other pole of the “Wyeth world” and a key partner for our work. Besides yours truly, the new guy, there are three Brandywine employees staffing the Wyeth Study Center, all of whom were previously employees of Betsy Wyeth and bring deep knowledge and experience to the work. They include

Karen Baumgartner in Chadds Ford, and Amy Morey and Leith MacDonald, both in Rockland.

Exhibitions will always be the most visible facet of our efforts and you can expect good things ahead in the beautifully renewed Andrew Wyeth Gallery on the third floor of the Brandywine—reopening in mid-summer with our next special exhibition, Abstract Flash: Unseen Andrew Wyeth—as well as in the spaces we program at the Farnsworth and in future traveling shows. However, just as there’s much more to Andrew Wyeth than meets the eye, so is there more to the Wyeth Study Center. Karen, Leith, Amy and I will be working hard for years to come to publish an authoritative compendium of the complete works of Andrew Wyeth—known in the field as a catalogue raisonné—and to ensure the collection is studied, digitized, stored and conserved according to Brandywine's exacting standards, while engaging in public programs and other outreach efforts to encourage new engagement with the legacy of one of America's most renowned artists. n

–William L. Coleman, Ph.D.