A Collector's Journey and Legacy: Selected Works from the Sterling Collection
on view from January 21 - March 13

This exhibition presents a wide range of art, from Ming Dynasty Chinese furniture to 19th century folk art portraits to Native American textiles and objects to works by American post-war and contemporary masters, emerging artists, and artists of Hawaii. These represent some of the diverse interests of Betty Sterling, a collector and former art dealer who for over 35 years divided her time between residences in Honolulu and New York City and who has been active in arts organizations here and on the mainland. The exhibition marks the uniting of her collection in Hawaii, following the sale of her New York apartment in early 2004. The exhibition also pays tribute to her remarkable journey into collecting art and her decision to give much of her collection, by gifts and future bequests, to museums in Hawaii and the mainland so that others may study and enjoy the works as she has had the privilege to do over several decades of acquiring and living with them.

Betty Sterling's appreciation for art was instilled early in her life, primarily by her mother, who had an interest in beautiful things and took Mary Elizabeth (Betty's christened name) to antique shows and museums throughout her childhood. The family lived in Pittsburgh, where Betty's father was a corporate lawyer, but from spring to fall they spent their time on a farm in rural western Pennsylvania. Betty's mother collected objects that appealed to her, particularly American country things, and Betty notes her mother "had a good eye" and a curiosity about the world that she instilled in her daughter. When Betty's father retired from law in the early 1930s, he moved the family to Williamsburg, Virginia, where they lived in a house on the Palace Green of the newly founded restoration, Colonial Williamsburg, further exposing Betty to early American decorative arts.

Betty obtained a BA degree in history in 19 and a MS degree in social work from the University of Connecticut in 1955. She took up a career in psychiatric social work in New York, got involved in politics, and started buying prints she could afford. Following her marriage in 19 to her second husband Edward Sterling, a scientist who encouraged her to pursue her interest in art and whose own family had an interest in collecting, primarily 19th-century European and American paintings, Betty started in business as a dealer in early American decorative arts, working out of a shop in Braintree, Vermont in summer and fall and privately from their New York apartment the rest of the year. Betty established a reputation as one of the first to promote American folk art, and her clients included many of the early prominent collectors who entered this field, such as Abby Aldrich Rockefeller, who with her husband John D. Rockefeller, Jr. founded Colonial Williamsburg, which includes a museum of her collection of folk art, and Ima Hogg, who created the Bayou Bend collection which is now part of the Museum of Fine Arts, Houston. Betty herself collected American folk art portraits, and the exhibition includes three striking examples, one a rare painting by Joshua Johnston, one of the first African American artists in the United States.

Another client was Ted Carpenter, director of the Heye Foundation, which is now the Museum of the American Indian in New York City. This friendship introduced Betty to Native American Art, of which she became an avid collector for over 20 years. The exhibition includes several works which reveal the breadth of her interest in this field: Southwestern Pueblo pottery and silver and turquoise jewelry, carvings from Pacific Northwest Coast and Eskimo peoples, and a large, embroidered and beaded blanket from the Osage tribe of the southern Great Plains.

Beginning in 1968, the Sterlings spent most winters in Honolulu, falling in love with Hawaii, its culture and environment. Spending time in Hawaii brought great exposure to and knowledge about Asian art, and Betty began collecting Chinese hardwood furniture and Chinese and Japanese ceramics.

Later a trip to South Korea stimulated an interest in antique Korean furniture. The exhibition includes 17th- and 18th-century Chinese chairs and a painting table, as well as a 19th-century Korean chest with ornate metal fittings.

Betty continued to run her business on the East Coast in summer and fall, and in the 1960s and 1970s she began to visit New York museums and galleries to develop a greater awareness of the art of her own time. She fell in love with the works of Robert Motherwell, and two highlights of the exhibition are a painting, Music over Music, and a painting/collage by this 20th-century master. Another of Betty's early contemporary art purchases was a drawing/collage by Christo from his important Storefronts series. The primary focus of Betty's collecting from the 1970s on has been contemporary art, and the exhibition includes works by Alexander Calder, Sam Francis, Willem de Kooning, David Smith, Frank Stella, Nancy Graves, Donald Sultan and Pat Steir. Betty has always maintained an interest in the new and in emerging artists, as well as a keen desire to collect works by contemporary artists of Hawaii, represented in the exhibition by works by Timothy Ojile, Dorothy Faison, Charles Cohan, Deborah Nehmad and Doug Young.

While Betty's interests and the collection she has formed may seem decidedly eclectic, throughout runs a sensibility--Betty's taste and eye--that brings everything into logical cohesion. The curiosity imbued at an early age gave Betty an openness to look at and appreciate things of beauty that perhaps others did not yet see. Her diverse life experiences led her to examine how works of art from different times, places and cultures might connect to each other and to appreciate the striving among all artists through time for good design and fine craftsmanship. Betty has been among the forefront of collectors who in the 20th century recognized the sophisticated relationships, for example, between the clean, geometric lines of Chinese furniture; the abstract designs on Native American pottery and textiles; the simple, straightforward honesty of folk art; and the bold stylistic explorations of contemporary art.

Betty Sterling and her family care deeply that the works in the collection she has lovingly assembled over her lifetime will continue to serve as sources of contemplation, education and enjoyment for future generations. Over the years Betty has given many works to the Honolulu Academy of Arts, where she serves as a Trustee, and some of these have been borrowed for this exhibition. Several of the works in the exhibition (among them the Pat Steir, Christo, and Donald Sultan mentioned above) have been designated as promised gifts to The Contemporary Museum, where Betty serves on the Collections Committee. The Joshua Johnston portrait is being donated to the Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco and will hang in the new DeYoung Museum opening later this year. Another folk art portrait by an unknown artist has been given to the William Benton Museum at Betty's alma mater, the University of Connecticut. Eventually other gifts and bequests from the Sterling collection will go to these museums and others.

"I want to show my gratitude and appreciation to the institutions and communities that mean so much to me in my life," Betty has said, "and I hope this will encourage others to give generously, whether it be art or other resources, so that many in the future may benefit from the experiences, discoveries, revelations, and joy gained through our respective lives."