DALLAS (1080 KRLD) - The family responsible for the Crow Museum of Asian Art has donated the entire collection to the University of Texas at Dallas.
The school will maintain the current museum in the Art District in downtown Dallas. The donation also includes $23 million for UT-Dallas to build a new exhibit space on its campus in Richardson to display items in the collection that are currently in storage.
"It's a great collection and we are deeply excited about it. It's opening up new dimensions for our university," said Dr. Hobson Wildenthal, Executive Vice-President of UT-Dallas.
The collection was assembled by long-time Dallas developer Trammel Crow and his wife Margaret. The museum opened in 1998, but it only showcases a portion of the pieces Crow collected over the years.
"We needed space," said Museum Executive Director Amy Lewis Hofland. "We were kind of hitting the ceiling."
The agreement with UT-D will allow the collection to expand while providing the museum with a long-term institutional partner. "The University isn't going anywhere, and we needed a forever future. This is the answer to our work toward sustainability beyond the founding family," Hofland said.
Officials with both the museum and the university are excited about the opportunities the arrangement will provide. "It's a really great opportunity to open up access to the students on campus and open up access for the Arts District to the northern regions," said Hofland. "I think there's a trail to blaze around what it's like to be a student at UT-Dallas and how to make that human experience more dimensional, and I also think that there's an opportunity to be more relevant to the communities around the University of Texas at Dallas."
UT-Dallas last year received the Barrett Collection, which consists of more than 400 works of Swiss art. The addition of the Crow collection, officials say, will boost the university's national reputation in the art world. "We started out just a few years ago with nothing. And i think now we really have got standing," said Dr. Hobson Wildenthal. "I think with the Barrett Museum and the Crow Museum, we're going to have art that the general public is going to want to see and that our students and faculty can benefit from both in their education and in their research."
