Enduring Generosity: Gifts of Art

Despite the COVID-19 pandemic, the broader community continued to be immensely generous through gifts of art to the collection of the Roswell Museum, your museum. Displayed here is a selection of artworks given to the museum 2017-2022. This small sample of the enduring generosity of donors highlights the breadth of these contributions to our collection.

Like most museums, the Roswell Museum has extremely limited means to purchase artwork. As such, the growth of the museum’s collection is really only possible through gifts. Accepting art donations is an honor and a responsibility. One of the central functions of a collecting institution is to properly ensure the care, preservation, and storage of objects of which it is a custodian for future generations to enjoy. As such, all proposed gifts to the museum are thoroughly reviewed by staff and the Board of Trustees for relevance to the museum’s pre-existing collection and artistic merit, keeping in mind limitations of storage space and resources to properly care for works. As a result, the museum is not in a position to accept all proposed donations.

This exhibition is a celebration of the generosity of our community and we are excited to share these works donated over the past 5 years. On display are works of art created from the early 1900s to 2010 by 33 individual artists. 7 of these artists were Roswell Artists-in-Residence between 1969 and 2012. Thank you to all donors to the museum, not only for the past 5 years, but for the entirety of our 85 years of existence. We look forward to continuing to share our collection as it grows over the years to come.