Dean Valentine Gives Hammer Museum Major Gift

The generous gift, including significant works by emerging Los Angeles artists over the last ten years, brings a contemporary sculpture collection to the Hammer.

The Hammer Museum announced today an important gift of more than 40 contemporary artworks, the great majority of them sculptures and mixed-media works, donated by Dean Valentine, Los Angeles television executive and media investor, and his wife Amy Adelson. The generous gift focuses on sculpture made in Southern California in the past decade and establishes the first significant concentration of contemporary sculpture at the Hammer Museum. The gift marks Dean Valentine's commitment to the Museum as a new member of its Board of Overseers.

"We are delighted to announce this generous gift by our new Overseer, Dean Valentine," said Ann Philbin, Director of the Hammer Museum. "The donation strengthens the new Hammer Contemporary Collection with excellent examples of the work of some of today's most vibrant and inventive sculptors."

A total of 24 artists are represented by the 42 works in the donation. The gift includes works by artists with established international reputations such as Jason Rhoades, Rirkrit Tiravanija, and Sam Durant. Many of the artists, including Xavier Cha, Liz Craft, Hannah Greely, Katie Grinnan, Evan Holloway, Matt Johnson, Nathan Mabry, Jason Meadows, Pentti Monkkonen, Paul Sietsema, and Eric Wesley received degrees from UCLA's BFA and MFA programs and are now emerging into national prominence.

"Amy and I feel privileged to have gotten to know these amazing artists and to have been able to put together this collection over the years," said Dean Valentine. "Its commitment to emerging artists and the dynamic curatorial team assembled by Annie Philbin make the Hammer the perfect home for the collection."

Among the highlights in the Valentine gift are Sam Durant's Upside-down and backwards, completely unburied, 1999, Hannah Greely's Weaver, Katie Grinnan's Wizard, 2004, Nathan Mabry's A Touching Moment (Tooting My Own Horn), 2005, Jason Meadows' Partially Rendered Antagonist, 2001, and Jason Rhoades' Silver Set Shutter Model, 2000.

"This gift instantaneously makes sculpture a new focus of the Hammer's contemporary collection," stated Gary Garrels, Chief Curator and Deputy Director of Exhibitions and Public Programs at the Hammer. "At a particularly active, fertile time for sculpture in Southern California, Dean Valentine has set the foundation for our collecting in this area."

ADDITIONAL RECENT GIFTS OF ART

Dean Valentine and Amy Adelson have previously donated drawings to the Hammer Museum, including works by Stephan Balkenhol, Nick Lowe, Nicola Tyson, Kara Walker, and Andrea Zittel. The Museum also has received important recent donations from other private individuals, whose contributions deepen the contemporary holdings of the Hammer Museum and Grunwald Center for the Graphic Arts.

In February 2006, Patrick Painter and Soo Jin Jeong-Painter donated more than 80 photographs, drawings, prints, videos and mixed media works to the Hammer Contemporary Collection. Among the highlights were several photographs by Roy Arden, three photographic series by Ed Ruscha, numerous photographic works by Christopher Williams and a thirteen-part photographic series by Christopher Wool, as well as works by Peter Doig, Paul McCarthy, Stephen Prina, Nancy Rubins and other significant artists.

Among other significant donors, long-time supporter and board member Werner Kramarsky and his wife Sarah-Ann have given 60 drawings, including seminal abstract works by Louise Bourgeois, Agnes Martin, Sol LeWitt and others. Los Angeles philanthropist J. David Haft has given four paintings by Milton Avery to the Hammer permanent collection as well as two watercolor and gouache works by Avery to the Grunwald Center. Among the myriad other gifts, a representative cross-section would include gifts from David Teiger who has donated a large Jim Shaw multi-panel work on paper and a monumental scroll by Yun Fei-Ji; Rosette Delug has given works by Catherine Opie and Dr. Lakra; Kourosh Larizadeh gave a sculpture by Mike Kelley; attorney Alan Hergott and his partner Curt Shepherd recently gave works by Nayland Blake, Zoe Leonard, and Steve Wolfe, among others; a painting by Mamma Andersson was recently gifted by Keith Pomeroy; a group of ten collages by Arturo Herrera was given by Chicago collectors Lewis and Susan Manilow; Marc Selwyn donated works by Mark Grotjahn, Martin Kersels and Monique Prieto; Roberts & Tilton gave Patty Chang watercolors; three Michaël Borremans paintings on paper, a large collage by Jockum Nordstrum, and a watercolor by Ken Price were acquired with funds provided by the Buddy Taub Foundation. Numerous other gifts and promised gifts also have been made in the past eighteen months.

A selection of works from these generous gifts, as well as from recent purchases, will be on view in two upcoming exhibitions: Hammer Contemporary Collection: Part I (January 16 - April 8, 2007) and Part II (April 21 - August 5, 2007). Part I will highlight photographic works and abstract drawings, including artists such as John Baldessari, Louise Bourgeois, Mark Grotjahn, Sharon Lockhart, Brice Marden, Agnes Martin, Catherine Opie, and Ed Ruscha, among many others. Part II will present works in all media, focusing on figurative and imagistic works.
-- www.hammer.ucla.edu