Art donation to AWC
The community art center has joined hands with the local community college in a win-win for culture in Yuma County. In January, the Yuma Fine Arts Association (YFAA) gave Arizona Western College its 400-piece Permanent Art Collection, which will be kept on campus for the benefit of the college and the entire southwest region of the state.
Eventually, the art will be displayed at various locations around campus, but the Fine Arts division must first create an inventory of all the whole collection and have the various pieces valued and insured. Until then the collection remains under the ownership of YFAA.
The donated pieces have been collected in a city-owned building in downtown Yuma since the YFAA began in 1962, when it was contracted by the City of Yuma to look after the exhibits. Early this year, the contract with the city wasn’t renewed, and both YFAA and the city felt that the art is historically important, and it should be donated locally and displayed to the community.
“It will benefit the community because it came from the community, and it came from a community organization,” said Brad Pease, AWC professor of graphic arts. “Many people around town were part of the organization itself.”
The art will help to provide college students with knowledge of local art history. Students enrolled in the Gallery Operations course will be creating their own art exhibits.
Students have shared with Pease their excitement to be part of the course and the collection. They can directly engage with the artwork, learning the significance of the collection, so there will be a larger investment from the students.
“It will help students create a curation process of the collection,” Pease said. “It also has history of Yuma and the arts going back to the beginning of the YFAA and their initial roots.”
Pease said that art preservation is especially important in the current cultural and economic climate.
“When budgets get tight, the first thing to get cut is arts,” he said. “If art has no value, what you are devaluing are all the efforts students are making in fine arts. But what is the first thing they do when they celebrate?” he added, referring to the use of artist such as music, painters and dancers.
“We have a strong program here at AWC because classes get jammed-packed quickly,” Pease said. “Even though we are a community college, there is great variety of art classes to be offered. The courses aren’t always easy; they involve time, practice and patience.”
Art has always helped society as a whole in understanding past cultures, which is why AWC is proud to be the care takers on the Permanent Art Gallery – not to mention reminding the community about its amazing history.
Photo by Dr. Michael Miller
