The Nasher Museum of Art at Duke University
Visit Us Exhibitions Collections Calendar Duke Faculty & Students Education Support About Us
 
                 
From the Director
From the Architect
Board of Advisors
Museum Café
Museum Store
Public Tours
Facility Rental
Contact Us
Opportunities
Mary Duke Biddle

Lifelong Friend of the Museum

When Mary Duke Biddle Trent Semans steps into the Great Hall that bears her name, she thinks of many other names - as clearly as if they were written on the pavilion walls, among shadows cast by the intricate glass and steel roof. The $24 million Nasher Museum of Art is about the people who worked for decades to make it happen, rather than simply the culmination of a 2½-year construction project.

"This goes back 30 years," says the great-granddaughter of Washington Duke, for whom the university is named. "You sort of have to know where things come from. They don't come out of the blue."

El Greco to Velazquez

 

New at the Nasher
New at the Nasher

 

Barkley L. Hendricks
Barkley L. Hendricks

 

Museum History

Many of the people who helped make the museum possible are no longer here to celebrate, Mrs. Semans points out.

She remembers the late Doug Knight, who served as Duke University's fifth president during the 1960s, and who pushed hard for the university to accept the gift of the Ernest Brummer collection of medieval sculpture and paintings in 1966. Thanks in part to Knight's leadership, the Duke University Museum of Art (DUMA) was established in 1969, in a former science building on East Campus.

She remembers the late Dr. William S. Heckscher, the German-born art historian and artist who came to Duke in 1966 to become chairman of the Art and Art History Department until 1969. He was director of DUMA from 1970 to 1974. He felt strongly that the museum should be an essential part of the university.

Mrs. Semans remembers the late Nancy Hanks, the 1949 Duke Woman's College alumna who was chairwoman of the National Endowment for the Arts from 1969 to 1977, and who served with Mrs. Semans on the Duke Board of Trustees in the late '60s. Hanks was a champion of the arts at Duke. After her death in 1983, an endowment was established in her name that still provides crucial support to Duke and the Nasher Museum of Art. The museum's Nancy Hanks Senior Curator is Sarah Schroth.

She remembers William Stars and John Spencer, past directors of the former DUMA, who worked hard to establish the museum's reputation in the 1970s and 80s.

Mrs. Semans remembers Dr. John O. Blackburn, who generously supported the museum while he was provost from 1970 to 1971.

She remembers Michael Mezzatesta, director of DUMA for 17 years until 2003, who worked tirelessly toward realizing the new museum. She notes particularly how he championed the new museum and poured his energy and enthusiasm into it.

She remembers her late mother, Mary Duke Biddle, who created a charitable foundation in 1956, near the end of her life. To date, The Mary Duke Biddle Foundation has awarded grants to Duke University totaling more than $30 million.

Since the museum's inception, the Biddle Foundation has generously given annual support to fund such programs as educational outreach, publications, art conservation, exhibitions and summer internships for students. This year, the Foundation gave $1 million to name one of the three gallery pavilions for the late Nicholas Benjamin Duke Biddle, the brother of Mrs. Semans and one of the first trustees of the Foundation.

Mrs. Semans remembers her late husband, Dr. James H. Semans, who attended many exhibition openings, Brummer dinners and other special events at her side. The couple's Duke-Semans Fine Arts Foundation has long worked closely with the museum and Duke students in supporting student-curated exhibitions. The Foundation has also made long-term loans to the museum of works by John Singer Sargent and Thomas Eakins, among other important artists. The museum raised funds to support the annual Mary and Jim Semans Lectures, to honor the couple.

This past spring, after Dr. Semans' death, an anonymous donation of $100,000 was made to the museum in his name, to establish an endowment to support future exhibitions.

"He was so dedicated to the idea of the museum," Mrs. Semans said. "We used to dream together."

The extended Duke family has helped the museum in many ways, too. The Duke Endowment, a charitable trust in Charlotte, N.C., has contributed $2.5 million to name the Great Hall in honor of Mrs. Semans, its chairman emerita. The endowment also has funded the directorship of the museum.

Mrs. Semans says she looks forward to celebrating the grand opening with other longtime supporters of the museum - some of whose names will also be on the museum's walls. She remembers her friendship with Raymond D. Nasher - class of 1943 - the museum's namesake, back in the '60s and '70s, when they served as Duke Trustees together. They would get together with Nancy Hanks, George McGhee and others after board meetings and dream of bigger things for the arts at Duke, she says. "The arts in general were not strong at Duke," she says. "We just had to fuss, and, well, it was depressing."

That fussing paid off. The museum comes at the right time for Duke and Durham, in the perfect location, accessible to both university and town.

"It's just a happy circumstance," she says. "My big hope of course is that it will be an extraordinary university art museum, an informative and delightful place for the cultural life of Duke University and Durham."

Museum Café Museum Store Contact Us Join Our List Press Photo Gallery Opportunities