A Backward Glance: Highlights from the William J. Glackens Collection
May 3, 2025, through February 7, 2027
The William J. Glackens Collection and Research Center at NSU Art Museum Fort Lauderdale houses more than 1,900 objects that tell the story of William J. Glackens, a pivotal figure in the development of twentieth-century American art. This extensive collection was entrusted to the Museum as the result of a bequest of Ira Glackens in 1990, which included all works of art located within his home at Shepardstown, West Virginia. The Sansom Foundation was bequeathed all other works and over the years has used that bequest to add to the works so bequeathed to the Museum. Thanks to the Foundation’s support, the Museum’s stewardship is enriched by ongoing research, deepening our understanding of the collection’s vital importance.
In 2014, the museum presented the first comprehensive survey of Glackens in nearly 50 years, curated by independent writer and art historian Avis Berman, which was augmented by a major monograph. Subsequent exhibitions organized by the museum focused on such subjects as Glackens’ representation of the new liberated woman of the early 1900s, seascapes, and the talented Glackens family, among others. A Backward Glance, the first full-scale highlights exhibition in a decade, builds on the research these focused exhibitions yielded. It also features works generously donated in recent years to the museum from the Sansom Foundation, including the majestic painting, Seated Actress with Mirror (c.1903).
William J. Glackens (b. 1870, Philadelphia, PA; d. 1938, Westport, CT) was a founding member of the turn-of-the-century artists’ group known as The Ashcan School, together with Robert Henri (1865–1929), Everett Shinn (1876–1953), John Sloan (1871–1951), and others. This exhibition presents many of Glackens’ most celebrated works alongside those he collected by his Ashcan peers, as well as paintings by his wife, watercolorist Edith Dimock Glackens, and their children, Ira and Lenna. Masterworks such as Cape Cod Pier (1908) and Artist’s Daughter in Chinese Costume (1918) are further enriched by displays of ephemera, including plein-air sketches, archival photographs, and printed materials, altogether offering a layered and intimate portrait of the artist’s life and creative process.
The exhibition guides viewers through key moments from William Glackens’ history, beginning with his work as an illustrator for publications such as Collier’s: The National Weekly and The New York Herald, and his time as an artist reporter on the frontlines in Cuba during the War of 1898. A Backward Glance also sheds light on some of the lesser-known ways in which Glackens was central to the advancement of modern art in America, such as in his role as chair of the American art committee for the 1913 Armory Show, his contribution to the establishment of the Barnes Foundation Collection, and his position as first president of the Society of Independent Artists in 1917.
This exhibition is curated by Ariella Wolens, Bryant-Taylor Curator at NSU Art Museum Fort Lauderdale.
This exhibition is sponsored by The Sansom Foundation, Inc.
