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To: vannrox
Six years ago, the Christian Science Monitor sneered at Bouguereau's work as "official art" that was mostly "purchased by rich, undereducated Americans."

Brings to mind a story about Henry Ford and his wife Clara.

Henry had very little in the way of formal education, but by 1920 or so he was of course wealthy, and perhaps the best known industrial tycoon in the world.

Yet his tastes remained, shall we say, simple.

He and his wife were visited by some art collectors who felt that persons of their socioeconomic stature should have invesmtments in fine art. So the collectors brought catalogs of color reproductions of available masterpieces and went over these with their hosts, explaining the virtues of each piece and its artist. It was understood that the catalog itself was a gift to the Fords.

At the end of the presentation, the collectors discreetly brought up the subject of acqusition of some of the works illustrated in the catalog.

One of the Fords (I do not recall which) replied, "but with all of these wonderful illustrations, why would we need the originals?"

As a coda to this little anecdote....

Henry's son Edsel was a very different soul. Although he was denied an education by his father, he (with the help of his society wife) became interested in the arts. He became a patron of the Detroit Institute of the Arts, and was responsible for bringing Diego Rivera and his mistress Frida Kahlo to Detroit for some time, to paint a monumental mural, depicting industrial America, at the DIA.

23 posted on 01/20/2003 11:45:35 AM PST by Erasmus
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To: Erasmus
Great story!
24 posted on 01/20/2003 12:08:43 PM PST by livius
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