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From The Art Newspaper:
By Charmaine Picard
NEW YORK. The Smithsonian Institution has received the Walt Disney-Tishman Collection of African art, a gift of 525 artefacts valued at $20 million to $50 million. Donated by the Walt Disney World Company, the collection will become part of the Smithsonian’s National Museum of African Art which is planning a major exhibition for February 2007.
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The Disney-Tishman collection is known for its encyclopaedic breadth representing 75 peoples and 20 countries and spanning five centuries. According to Ms [Brenda] Freyer [curator of collections at the Smithsonian National Museum of African Art], the Tishmans “wanted to have an example of every major known African art type. Mr Tishman was one of the last great generalist African art collectors. To buy these large-scale and figurative pieces today would be very expensive”. She added that the donation fills several gaps in the museum’s 8,000-strong collection of objects by introducing a greater selection of West African pieces while providing depth in areas such as the institution’s Central African art holdings.
A stipulation of the gift requires the Smithsonian to exhibit at least 60 works in a room labelled the Walt Disney-Tishman Collection for the next 30 years. The terms of the donation are fairly flexible and the museum can rotate this selection, and incorporate works from the donation into other exhibitions...[read full article]
For spirits and kings : African art from the Paul and Ruth Tishman collection, an exhibition held at the Met in 1981, featured 150 works from this important collection. Goldwater Library call number of the catalog, edited by Susan Vogel : O2 N545f Ref
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