Colorado Springs (July 23, 2019) — The Colorado Springs Fine Arts Center at Colorado College is pleased to announce a grant award from The Andy Warhol Foundation for the Visual Arts. The Fine Arts Center is the first Colorado-based nonprofit to receive a Curatorial Research Fellowship since the program’s inception in 2008.
The $45,000 grant will support a Curatorial Research Fellowship for the development of the exhibition Queer Indigenous Visualities, scheduled to open in September 2021. The planning project will include convenings of the curatorial team with artists, scholars and activists, artist studio visits, archival research, a public program and documentation.
Grant recipient Polly Nordstrand, FAC Curator of Southwest Art, will hold the fellowship and drive curation of the exhibition designed to provide a corrective to historical considerations of Native American art that have ignored the significant contributions of Queer artists. Working with Michelle McGeough from the University of British Columbia and V. Gina Diaz from the University of New Mexico, Nordstrand is looking into the practices of contemporary Latinx and Indigenous LGBTQIA+ artists.
In accordance with Andy Warhol’s will, the mission of The Andy Warhol Foundation for the Visual Arts is the advancement of the visual arts. The foundation manages an innovative and flexible grants program while also preserving Warhol’s legacy through creative and responsible licensing policies and extensive scholarly research for ongoing catalogue and raisonne projects. To date, the foundation has given more than $200 million in cash grants to over 1,000 arts organizations in 49 states and abroad and has donated 52,786 works of art to 322 institutions worldwide.
Quote from Polly Nordstrand, Curator of Southwest Art, Colorado Springs Fine Arts Center at Colorado College
“As an academic museum, the Colorado Springs Fine Arts Center at Colorado College is committed to presenting new scholarship to our public. The exhibition will be an important contribution to the fields of art history and Indigenous studies by bringing awareness to the work of Queer artists and their role in creating Indigenous futures. As a collaborative curatorial project, we anticipate the dialogues in planning the exhibition to also be generative for our communities.”
Quote from Rachel Bers, Program Director, The Andy Warhol Foundation for the Visual Arts
“The foundation is very pleased to support Polly Nordstrand’s research into the practices of queer Latinx and Indigenous artists whose work has been largely ignored in contemporary art discourse. The resulting exhibition and public programs promise to raise the visibility of important experimental artists and to contribute new perspectives to the field of contemporary art history.”
Colorado Springs Fine Arts Center at Colorado College
The story of the Colorado Springs Fine Arts Center at Colorado College (FAC) begins with the founding of the Broadmoor Art Academy by Julie and Spencer Penrose in 1919. For 100 years, 30 West Dale Street has been the hub of rich cultural history throughout the region. The Broadmoor Art Academy served as a pillar in the cultural community of the Rocky Mountain West. During the Great Depression, three dedicated philanthropists – Julie Penrose, Alice Bemis Taylor, and Elizabeth Sage Hare – envisioned expanding the Broadmoor Art Academy into an entire arts district under one roof – ultimately evolving into what is known today as the Colorado Springs Fine Arts Center at Colorado College. The FAC is deeply rooted in the legacy of its founders, who possessed bold visions, a deep passion for the arts, and dedication to the Colorado Springs community. The FAC honors this legacy and spirit today by providing innovative, educational, and multidisciplinary arts experiences designed to elevate the individual spirit and inspire community vitality, building on its history as a unique cultural pillar of the Pikes Peak region. For more information, visit fac.coloradocollege.edu.
