Herbert Waide Hemphill Jr. dedicated his life to collecting works by little known folk artists.
In 1986, he donated more than 400 objects in his collection to the Smithsonian American Art Museum, a gift that tripled our folk art collection.
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Herbert Waide Hemphill Jr. dedicated his life to collecting works by little known folk artists.
In 1986, he donated more than 400 objects in his collection to the Smithsonian American Art Museum, a gift that tripled our folk art collection.
When the Hemphill Collection was first exhibited, museum director Elizabeth Broun wrote of the groundbreaking collector:
"Bert Hemphill's astonishing ability to see what was invisible to so many others left him free to roam in uncharted territories of art. Like an explorer, he came back from his collecting trips with exotic items that fit no established order, selected for the special appeal they held for him. Remarkably, these private passions hold the same appeal for a broad public, perhaps because they so forcefully engage life's fundamental aspects—family, politics, sexuality, work, nature, religion."
Today's portrait of Hemphill was painted by Rev. Howard Finster, an evangelical Baptist minister who made more than 40,000 artworks. Finster died just a few months ago, in October 2001.
Source: Elizabeth Broun, introduction to Made with Passion: The Hemphill Folk Art Collection in the National Museum of American Art (Washington, D.C. and London: National Museum of American Art with the Smithsonian Institution Press, 1990).
Pictured: Howard Finster, 1916–2001, THE HERBERT WADE HEMPHILL J.R. COLLECTION FOUNDER OF AMERICAN FOLK ART THE MAN WHO PRESERVES THE LONE AND FORGOTTEN. THE UNKNOWN COLLECTIOn., 1978, enamel on plywood, 79 1/2 x 50 in., Smithsonian American Art Museum, Gift of Herbert Waide Hemphill Jr. and museum purchase made possible by Ralph Cross Johnson.