Featured Collector

William T. Evans donated his collection to the Smithsonian American Art Museum nearly one hundred years ago.

Evans, whose portrait is shown here, was a major collector and proponent of contemporary American art during the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. He housed his large collection in a long painting gallery in the New York mansion he built in 1891 with the fortune from his dry goods business. The gallery is seen in an 1899 photograph below.

Evans donated 150 paintings representing 105 American artists to the Smithsonian between 1907 and 1915. His collection included works by the now celebrated painters Albert Blakelock, Frederick S. Church, Childe Hassam, Winslow Homer, George Inness, Thomas Moran, and Frederick Remington.

In his desire to promote American art and artists, Evans intended his gift to be flexible rather than a static monument to his accomplishments as a collector. In writing to the secretary of the Smithsonian in 1907 about his donation he noted: "I have every reason to believe you will like my selections, but should any of the examples not hold up well, others can be substituted, as it is my desire to have every artist represented at his best."

Source: William Truettner. "William T. Evans, Collector of American Paintings," American Art journal, vol. 3, no. 2, Fall 1971, pp. 50–79.

Pictured top: Alphonse Jongers, 1872 France–1945 USA, William T. Evans, n.d., oil, 36 1/8 x 28 1/4 in., Smithsonian American Art Museum, Gift of William T. Evans.

Pictured bottom: Gallery of William T. Evans, 1899.