Recent Acquisitions

The Art Complex Museum is pleased to announce that it added 49 objects to its permanent collection throughout 2024. These additions are significant in that they contribute to the development of the core collection built by the museum’s founders, adding to the depth and scope of collecting areas to which the founders were devoted.

Works acquired in 2024 include two paintings, a portrait of museum co-founder Edith Greenleaf Weyerhaeuser by Ture Bengtz, the ACM’s first director, and a landscape, Pond Under Blue Hill by John Joseph Enneking. The addition of the portrait is significant, especially considering the sitter’s integral role in founding this organization, and the artist’s special relationship to the museum. The Enneking painting marks the fifth in the collection by that artist, the other four being just some of many paintings acquired by the museum founders via Vose Galleries.

Newly acquired prints and works on paper include two portfolios, Back and Forth by members of Full Tilt Print Studio a not-for-profit cooperative printmaking studio in Deham, MA, and The Art Connection portfolio, a suite of 9 original lithographs, initiated to support The Art Connection, Inc. produced with the collaboration of Tamarind Master Printer Carolyn Muskat. Also added to this area of the collection were prints by American artists Rockwell Kent and Ryah Ludins, lithographs by Mexican artist Alfredo Zalce, a mixed-media drawing by Ture Bentz, and a three-dimensional print by Christine Beneman, recipient of the Boston Printmakers’ Ture Bentz award.

Two pinch-formed vessels by Paul S. Briggs stand out as significant additions to the museum’s collection of Western studio ceramics. Outdoor sculptures added to the permanent collection include Landscape Lounger, a sculptural bench by Nancy Selvage, and a kinetic weathervane sculpture by Jonathan Bonner. Last but not least, a finely made pincushion was added to the museum’s esteemed collection of Shaker objects.

All of these works were chosen to provide new exhibition opportunities, to add context to existing work in the collection, and to enhance the experience of visitors for years to come. The museum is sincerely grateful for the generosity of those who donated artwork in 2024. A sincere thanks goes out to the Boston Printmakers, the family of Helene and Joseph A. Chazan, Mary M. Coogan, Robert C. “Terry” Vose III, and the Weyerhaeuser family.

We are also grateful to those whose offers did not align with the museum’s mission and scope of collections, and we hope you will continue to consider the Art Complex Museum for future gifts.

The scope of the Art Complex Museum’s permanent collection is rooted in the personal interests of museum co-founders Carl A. Weyerhaeuser and Edith Greenleaf Weyerhaeuser. The Weyerhaeuser’s collection of art and artifacts is the core of the ACM’s collection today, and since the Museum opened in 1971, the collection has grown through significant gifts, bequests, and acquisitions.

The major strengths of the collection are American Paintings; Shaker Furniture & Artifacts; Works on Paper, the majority of which are American and European prints; Asian Art, which encompasses paintings, bronzes and ceramics; and Additional Treasures, a diverse group of exceptional objects that include European paintings, Native North American art, Middle Eastern art, Contemporary American craft and more.

If you wish to offer a gift or acquisition opportunity to the Art Complex Museum, please contact the museum’s Collections Manager.