Kirkland Museum of Fine & Decorative Art

Specialties

Kirkland Museum of Fine & Decorative Art has one of the most important public displays of international decorative art in North America, from about 1875 to about 1990. More than 3,500 works are on view of Arts & Crafts, Aesthetic, Art Nouveau, Glasgow Style, Wiener Werkstätte, De Stijl, Bauhaus, Art Deco, Modern, Pop Art and Postmodern. A major survey of Colorado art and some regional art is documented. Over 650 works by more than 200 artists are shown at any one time, drawing from a collection of more than 500 Colorado artists and about 5,000 works. The Colorado and regional art collection is concerned with a period from 1820 to about 1990 (traditional through modern), with an emphasis on the 1850s onwards. The museum features a retrospective of Colorado’s distinguished painter, Vance Kirkland (1904 – 1981). Kirkland Museum joins the studios of Jackson Pollock & Lee Krasner, Thomas Hart Benton, Grant Wood, Charles Russell, N.C. Wyeth, Georgia O’Keeffe and other sites as a member of Historic Artists’ Homes and Studios, a program of the National Trust for Historic Preservation.

Please note: Due to the fragile nature of the collections and the popular but vulnerable salon style in which they are displayed, Kirkland Museum limits all visitors during open hours and events to those age 13 and up. Children between the ages of 13 and 17 are welcome, but must be accompanied by an adult.

History

Established in 2003.

Painter Vance Kirkland of Ohio (1904 – 1981) became director of the University of Denver’s School of Art at Chappell House in January of 1929. In 1932, Kirkland left the university and rented (and later purchased) the 1910 – 1911 art school building at 1311 Pearl Street and started the Kirkland School of Art (1932 – 1946). In 1946, the University of Denver enticed Kirkland to return. When Kirkland retired from the university in 1969, the art school had over 500 students. From 1932 until his death in 1981, Kirkland used 1311 Pearl Street as his personal studio.

In May of 1981 Vance Kirkland passed away and left his entire estate to family friend Hugh Grant. Kirkland Foundation was established in 1996 to preserve and promote the works of Vance Kirkland and the other collections, and an addition was built to house the museum. Kirkland Museum opened to the public on April 2, 2003, displaying the works of Kirkland, his Colorado and regional colleagues and international decorative art.