In 1977, Martha Beck opened The Drawing Center at 137 Greene Street in SoHo as a showroom the works of emerging and under-recognized artists as well as rare drawings by the masters. According to the New York Times, Beck felt that drawings were often neglected by museums so The Drawing Center was established to fill that void and now stands as the only fine arts institution in the country to focus on the art form. Ms. Beck passed away on January 6 at the age of 75, though her legacy lives on.
Beck's involvement with running the Drawing Center (which moved to it's current location on Wooster Street in the '80s) has been minimal since she was replaced in 1990 by Ann Philbin, but by then she had already built an impressive reputation for the museum that still allows them to acquire unlikely loans from some of the rarest and most important collections around the world. Artists including Kara Walker, William Kentridge, and Glenn Ligon saw their work showcased to a wide audience for the first time thanks to Beck's Drawing Center, presented in the same space as works by Michelangelo, Brancusi, Picasso, Matisse, and Rodin.
For more information about the Drawing Center and the culture of drawing appreciation that Martha Beck helped create, visit their website here.
[viaNew York Times]
