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Seattle collector adds to PLU collection
November 02, 2007
A wooden effigy and two masks have joined the Lehmann African Art Collection housed in Mordvedt Library.
Donated by Seattle collector Oliver Cobb and his wife, Pamela, the pieces are the first to be given to the collection by someone other than J. Hans and Thelma Lehmann, who the collection is named for.
At a coffee reception last week, Cobb said he chose to donate the pieces to PLU because they will be permanently on display. He didn’t want the art hidden away in storage.
“Here, they can be enjoyed by students all the time,” he said.
Additionally, the collection acts as a teaching tool, said Neal Sobania, director of the Wang Center for International Programs. The sculptures and masks can be handled and touched, which is more valuable than simply looking at slides. The collection is an especially handy teaching tool for students interested in museum careers, as they can learn how to correctly catalogue pieces of fine art, he added.
Cobb is well known among African art specialists as being one of the premier collectors in the Northwest. After a visit to Thelma Lehmann (Hans Lehmann passed away in 1996), Cobb visited PLU out of curiosity and to see pieces in the collection. He was impressed at how visible the art was, and that it could be studied and handled.
The pieces he gave to PLU are a bongo wood male funerary effigy from Sudan, a bete wood face mask from the Ivory Coast and a makonde wood male helmet mask from Mozambique. He also donated two less significant pieces, a carved staff and advertisement for a barbershop.
The Lehmann African Art Collection was established in 1972, when the Lehmanns donated the “Fertility Figure” from the Ivory Coast. Like Cobb, the Lehmanns chose to give pieces of their collection to PLU because the university promised a permanent display, explained Dick Moe, emeritus dean of the School of Arts.
The Lehmann’s first visited PLU in 1967, to attend a performance of the Robert Joffrey Ballet, which was staying in residence on campus. Moe befriended the Lehmanns. When the couple made their initial gift, it was Moe who promised the art would be displayed “in perpetuity.”
Over the next few years other pieces followed to create one of the most important and valuable collections of African art in the Pacific Northwest. The collection, on display around the staircase in Mortvedt, includes masks and sculptures hailing from Africa and Oceania.
“Art is an important part of what students ought to get in a liberal arts education,” Sobania said.
Art has a history. For example, African and Oceanic art influenced the impressionist painters, such as Picasso, Sobania said. With PLU’s global focus, it’s important that the university has art from other parts of the world.
Back when the collection was first established, Moe said he knew it was important for PLU to house the Lehmanns’ gifts.
“We were emerging as a university with an international focus,” he explained. “It seemed a natural fit for our campus, which had no African art.”
University Communications staff writer Megan Haley compiled this report. Comments, questions, ideas? Please contact her at ext. 8691 or at haleymk@plu.edu. Photo by University Photographer Jordan Hartman.
At a coffee reception last week, Cobb said he chose to donate the pieces to PLU because they will be permanently on display. He didn’t want the art hidden away in storage.
“Here, they can be enjoyed by students all the time,” he said.
Additionally, the collection acts as a teaching tool, said Neal Sobania, director of the Wang Center for International Programs. The sculptures and masks can be handled and touched, which is more valuable than simply looking at slides. The collection is an especially handy teaching tool for students interested in museum careers, as they can learn how to correctly catalogue pieces of fine art, he added.
Cobb is well known among African art specialists as being one of the premier collectors in the Northwest. After a visit to Thelma Lehmann (Hans Lehmann passed away in 1996), Cobb visited PLU out of curiosity and to see pieces in the collection. He was impressed at how visible the art was, and that it could be studied and handled.
The pieces he gave to PLU are a bongo wood male funerary effigy from Sudan, a bete wood face mask from the Ivory Coast and a makonde wood male helmet mask from Mozambique. He also donated two less significant pieces, a carved staff and advertisement for a barbershop.
The Lehmann African Art Collection was established in 1972, when the Lehmanns donated the “Fertility Figure” from the Ivory Coast. Like Cobb, the Lehmanns chose to give pieces of their collection to PLU because the university promised a permanent display, explained Dick Moe, emeritus dean of the School of Arts.
The Lehmann’s first visited PLU in 1967, to attend a performance of the Robert Joffrey Ballet, which was staying in residence on campus. Moe befriended the Lehmanns. When the couple made their initial gift, it was Moe who promised the art would be displayed “in perpetuity.”
Over the next few years other pieces followed to create one of the most important and valuable collections of African art in the Pacific Northwest. The collection, on display around the staircase in Mortvedt, includes masks and sculptures hailing from Africa and Oceania.
“Art is an important part of what students ought to get in a liberal arts education,” Sobania said.
Art has a history. For example, African and Oceanic art influenced the impressionist painters, such as Picasso, Sobania said. With PLU’s global focus, it’s important that the university has art from other parts of the world.
Back when the collection was first established, Moe said he knew it was important for PLU to house the Lehmanns’ gifts.
“We were emerging as a university with an international focus,” he explained. “It seemed a natural fit for our campus, which had no African art.”
University Communications staff writer Megan Haley compiled this report. Comments, questions, ideas? Please contact her at ext. 8691 or at haleymk@plu.edu. Photo by University Photographer Jordan Hartman.