Ford Motor Company
Dearborn, Michigan
 
Bestowed 1997

Ford Motor Company has been supporting the arts for more than 50 years throughout the United States and in its global markets to foster understanding and appreciation of various cultures, to broaden access to the arts, to increase educational opportunities, and to enhance the quality of life.

Ford has benefited the arts, business and the community by:

• Sponsoring museum exhibitions in the United States and abroad. To increase understanding of African cultures, Ford collaborated with the Field Museum of Natural History in Chicago, Illinois to develop “Africa: One Continent. Many Worlds.” This exhibition traveled to 12 venues in the United States through 2000. The company also sponsored the first major exhibition of Latin American folk art, “Visiones del Pueblo: The Folk Art of Latin America,” which showcased the folk art traditions of Latin America, and underwrote a bilingual educational program which accompanied this exhibition. To share the art from many of the historic houses of Great Britain, Ford underwrote “The Treasure Houses of Great Britain” in 1989 in the National Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C. The Company also sponsored “El Alma del Pueblo: Spanish Folk Art and its Transformation in the Americas,” an exhibition that explored the nature of Spanish folk art and the vital role it plays in past and present Spanish society. It opened in the San Antonio Museum of Art, San Antonio, Texas and traveled to six cities across the country through 1999.
• Sponsoring the international exhibition “British Art Treasures from Russian Imperial Collections in The Hermitage.” This exhibition, which opened in 1996, traveled to three venues in the United States and closed in The Hermitage Museum, St. Petersburg, Russia. The following year, the company underwrote the opening of the Globe Theatre in London, England; “Jasper Johns,” a major retrospective in the Ludwig Museum in Cologne, Germany; and “Roloff Beny,” an exhibition shown in Budapest, Lisbon, London, Madrid, Ottawa, Paris and Prague through 1998. Ford also sponsored “India: A Celebration of Independence: 1947-1997,” an exhibition of 200 photographs taken in India since its independence from Great Britain. This exhibition opened in the Philadelphia Museum of Art, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania and traveled to nine additional venues in the United States and five in India through 1999.
• Becoming one of the first companies to assist the museum community in the exploration of new ways to address shifts in funding and in the development of new audiences. For example, it encouraged five museums — The Carnegie Museum of Art, Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania; The Minneapolis Institute of Art, Minneapolis, Minnesota; The Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, Kansas City, Missouri; The Saint Louis Art Museum, Saint Louis, Missouri and The Toledo Museum of Art, Toledo, Ohio — to collaborate to present a major exhibition of Impressionist works drawn from their permanent collections. Ford encouraged the museums to share the tasks of organizing, promoting and touring the exhibition — “Impressionism: Selections from Five American Museums” — and it worked with the consortium to create an educational component. As part of this component, Ford worked with its dealers to display works of art in their showrooms that were created by children who attended the exhibition.
• Fostering broad participation in the arts by encouraging its dealers to underwrite student and teacher visits to exhibitions it sponsors, and providing vans decorated with images from the exhibitions to transport students and teachers to and from the exhibition venue. To broaden community participation, Ford often appoints a “Committee of Honor” — comprised of community leaders, Ford dealers and company employees — to serve as a liaison between the museum presenting the exhibition and the community. Many Ford dealers also distribute exhibition materials in local public schools.
• Providing general operating and project support to more than 300 visual and performing arts organizations throughout the United States, and encouraging its employees to serve the arts as volunteers and members of their boards of directors.