Support Our Campaign
Inspire the Next Generation through Art
As we celebrate the fiftieth anniversary of the Museum this year, we reflect on its vibrant history and prepare for its future—and for the future of the arts at Cornell.
Energized by the university’s To Do the Greatest Good capital campaign, the Johnson Museum aspires to serve its communities as a space of educational verve, fueled by collaborative, multidisciplinary learning and innovative approaches to teaching with original works of art.
Below are three highlighted priorities, and we warmly invite you to consider supporting one in honor of the Museum’s milestone year.
Enhance Our Museum Training Program
We put students at the center of all that we do, and our interns—numbering 75 this year alone—enliven and advance our work in nearly every department. The Johnson Museum has a history of training many of today’s museum leaders: our former interns have gone on to become chief curator at San Francisco Museum of Art, senior curator of prints and drawings at the Philadelphia Museum of Art, and join the staffs of the Metropolitan Museum of Art and the National Gallery of Singapore, among many others. We also aim to diversify the field by mentoring students from historically underrepresented groups. Gifts toward our museum training program help us prepare not only the next generation of museum professionals, but museum patrons and lovers of the arts though hands-on experience and engaged learning.
Care for Our Extraordinary Building
This campaign will support the careful conservation of our greatest work of art: the architectural gem that is our I. M. Pei–designed building. Central to this priority is our print room renovation, a one-of-a-kind space where students learn the fundamentals of collections care and object-based research. The print room is a true workhorse of multidisciplinary teachings across the university, housing a world-class collection of 16,000 original works by Albrecht Dürer, Rembrandt van Rijn, Jacob Lawrence, Mary Cassatt, Henri Matisse, and many more. When complete, a newly imagined print room will be accessible to the public for the first time in its history, opening up new opportunities to local and global visitors, and students and scholars of all ages.
Bring a World of Exhibitions to Ithaca
Annual exhibitions present new scholarship and fresh perspectives on the Museum’s collection, and bring new works to Ithaca on loan from private collectors and institutions around the world. Many are inspired by the Cornell curriculum and represent partnerships with faculty, graduate students, other museums, and source communities, including Art and Environmental Struggle, which featured primarily Indigenous artists responding to climate challenges in their countries and communities, and Visions of Dante, which brought contemporary art together with Cornell Library’s Fiske Dante Collection. The Johnson Museum regularly presents global contemporary art as a catalyst for deeper understanding of the world and our place in it, and by bringing the artists and art of our time to Ithaca, the campus community and wider region can explore compelling issues and broaden perspectives.
We seek to inspire the next generation of Cornellians who feel deeply connected to the university because of the sense of belonging, curiosity, and delight they experience at the Johnson Museum of Art.
We would welcome the chance to schedule a discussion if you would like to learn more about these ideas and the difference you can make through your philanthropy at the Museum.
Contact Us
Courtney Campbell
Director of Development
ccn44@cornell.edu
(607) 254-4624
Tammy Sritecha
Major Gift Associate
tsritecha@cornell.edu