Robert Motherwell, Untitled

Luther W. Brady Collection

For more than a quarter century, Luther W. Brady, M.D., H'88, has been donating works of European and American art to Colgate University. To date he has given seventy-nine objects in various media and has placed a similar number here as deferred gifts. With this exhibition, the Picker celebrates his inspiring gift and the publication of a catalogue documenting the Brady Collection in full.

Because Dr. Brady's donations were designed to support the University's teaching mission, his gift represents periods and styles that range from Baroque paintings to Postmodern prints and drawings. Despite this intentional diversity, one can easily discern in the Brady Collection the passion for mid-century modernism—especially Abstract Expressionism and its successors—that also informs Dr. Brady's extensive personal holdings.

While Dr. Brady's support would be noteworthy in any circumstance, it is especially so because he had no prior connection to Colgate University. Born in North Carolina and reared in and around Washington, D.C., he is an alumnus of the George Washington University and Medical School. After his internship, residency, and stint in the Navy, he settled in Philadelphia, where he is a leader in the field of radiation oncology and an active philanthropist and patron of the arts.

Dr. Brady's relationship to Colgate began with his gift of Sunset, a sculpture by Eric Ryan, now permanently installed in the Eric Ryan Studio Center on campus. He donated that work in memory of the artist, who was his friend and a beloved member of the Colgate Fine Arts faculty. With that gift, Dr. Brady and Dewey Mosby, then Gallery director, began a collaboration to develop the Brady Collection at Colgate and the substantial body of student research and curatorial projects that it spurred.

The exhibition War Fallout: Mid-century Modernism in the Luther W. Brady Collection focuses on the mid-century modernism that is the heart of Dr. Brady's gift and a special passion of the collector. Thanks to the breadth and depth of the Collection, this show traces important themes of the 1940s through the 1970s as represented in works by key players of the period. The exhibition is comprised primarily of drawings and includes multiple examples by Richard Diebenkorn, Hans Hofmann, Robert Motherwell, and Kenneth Noland, as well as individual works by Jean DuBuffet, Barbara Hepworth, and Asger Jorn.