Welcome to the Anderson Collection
Stanford University's free museum of modern and contemporary American art

Open Wed - Sun

11 a.m. – 5 p.m.

Advance reservations not required.
Click here for group visits.

News

Up Close: One Painting Tours With Artists

A project of the Anderson Collection at Stanford University Hosted by art historian and the associate director of ITALIC at Stanford, Kim Beil, the micro-video series “Up Close: One Painting Tours with Artists” focuses on a single object in the Anderson Collection, sparking dialogue with a guest artist. This project is made possible by a grant from Stanford Arts and the Anderson Collection at Stanford University. Artist Rebekah Goldstein explor…

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The Cantor and Anderson Collection offer free membership to Class of 2020

The Cantor and Anderson Collection offer free membership to Class of 2020…

Elite Collection of Modern Masters to Anchor Stanford’s Growing ‘Arts District’

News

Full House

Full House What does a family with one of the most spectacular private collections of postwar American art do when they run out of space? Give some of it away. June 12, 2014 9:30 AM | by Pilar Viladas There are people who live with art, and then there are Harry W. and Mary Margaret Anderson. Better known as Hunk and Moo, the Andersons, who are 91 and 87, respectively, share their comfortable, unpretentious ranch house in Atherton, California,…

News

Opening gala for Anderson Collection at Stanford draws artists

Mary Patricia “Putter” Anderson Pence’s voice quavered at the microphone, for good reason. The Sept. 19 opening of the Anderson Collection at Stanford University was an “incredible journey,” she said, not only for the school, but for her parents, Harry W. “Hunk” Anderson, a food distribution company magnate, and his wife, Mary Margaret, a.k.a. “Moo.” The quiet couple’s trove of modern and contemporary art, regarded among the world’s finest, fill…

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A Dorm-Food Fortune Has Funded the Best New Museum in Silicon Valley

Contrary to popular belief, Stanford isn’t strictly a Silicon Valley trade school for Internet billionaires. It also trains Internet millionaires—as well as, believe it or not, thousandaire philosophers, journalists, and artists! Because aside from computer science and electrical engineering, Stanford offers degrees in a full range of humanities disciplines, including the fine arts. To that end, two months ago the university opened a small, gl…

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Contemplations on Sam Francis’s art

As I walked into the Anderson Collection on a Saturday morning, I stumbled upon a contemporary exhibition on Sam Francis, a Bay Area artist. Before reading the descriptions, I strolled around the room past some abstract expressionism and self-portraits that resembled sketches. I started to read the descriptions on the walls, and learned that Francis spent time in Japan, where he was influenced by local culture. I was looking at a painting that…

Exhibition

Manuel Neri: Assertion of the Figure

The Catalogues

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Anderson Collection opens to public on Sept. 21

The Anderson Collection opens to the public at its new Stanford University home this Sunday, Sept. 21, in a freestanding pavilion next to the Cantor Arts Center in the University’s growing arts district. Members of the Cantor Arts Center and the Anderson Collection can also attend a special preview of the museum on Sept. 20. Opening day festivities will include food trucks, music, activities and digital tours. Admission is free, and while visito…

News

Anderson Collection at Stanford solidifies Bay Area’s art stature

When the Anderson Collection at Stanford University opens to the public this Sunday, visitors will be rewarded with a breathtaking introduction to one of the world’s most important private collections. The long-anticipated institution, adjacent to the Cantor Arts Center, features a formidable cache of modern and contemporary art and certifies the Bay Area’s growing international stature as a destination for lovers and scholars of 20t…

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A&E Digest

A&E Digest: Student scholarships, fashion for a cause and more This week’s A&E news by Elizabeth Schwyzer / Palo Alto Weekly Twenty-seven student artists from Santa Clara and San Mateo counties have been awarded scholarships for by the Community School of Music and Arts. Photo courtesy of CSMA. This week, students win art scholarships, a film on feminist art screens at Stanford and international fashion designers sell their goods…

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The Museum of Hunk, Moo & Putter: The Anderson Collection at Stanford will Rock You

Tom Teicholz Contributor Arts I write about culture and the cult of luxury On a recent trip to San Francisco, I decided to make a short detour to the Anderson Collection at Stanford University (easily reachable by public transport from San Francisco or from the airport) – it is very much worth the trip. The Anderson Collection is very much focused on American Art of the 20thCentury in general, with a specific concentration on West Coast…

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‘Formed & Fired: Contemporary American Ceramics’ at the Anderson Collection breaks the mold

From ancient pottery and medicinal clay to 3D-printed joints and pajamas that restore athletes’ muscles, the use of ceramics for objects rooted in decoration, ritual and utility is as old as it is expansive. The practices of four living artists whose exploration of the medium provides commentary on its past and insight for the future are presented in Formed & Fired: Contemporary American Ceramics at the Anderson Collection at Stanford Univer…

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A new start for art at Stanford: Cantor Arts Center and Anderson Collection reopen

A new start for art at Stanford: Cantor Arts Center and Anderson Collection reopen Sheryl Nonnenberg 7-8 minutes After more than a year of closure, Stanford University’s major art museums — Cantor Arts Center and the Anderson Collection at Stanford — are open again. A visit to campus reveals that, while some things have remained the same (the venerable Rodin sculpture collection, for example), there have been some significant c…

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New acquisition by David Park on view at the Anderson Collection

New acquisition by David Park on view at the Anderson Collection The museum reopens to the public on Wednesday, Sept. 22, 2021. ROBIN WANDER | September 15, 2021 Late last year, the Anderson Collection at Stanford University received a gift from two individuals, one who has been giving the gift of time to the museum for years and the other an alumnus. Keith Jantzen and his husband, Scott Beth, ’82, donated Untitled (Portrait of Tom Jef…

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The Collection of a Lifetime

To the Andersons, their art is family—and so is Stanford, its new caretaker. September/October 2014 The Collection of a Lifetime To the Andersons, their art is family—and so is Stanford, its new caretaker. ©Henrik Kam 2014 The striking centerpiece of the new Anderson Collection building is a grand staircase ascending to the main gallery spaces—airy, open, graced with natural light—and their cornucopia of art. When the collection opens on Septemb…

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Stanford unveils the Anderson Collection: New museum dedicated to renowned works of American art

by Sheryl Nonnenberg / Palo Alto Weekly “How did they fit all this art in their house?” That was the question of the day at the media preview for Stanford’s new Anderson Collection, which opens to the public with a grand celebration this Sunday, September 21. Being surrounded by museum-quality works by artists including Mark Rothko, Jackson Pollock and Richard Diebenkorn was a way of life for collectors Harry W. and Mary Marga…

News

A Private Passion Goes Public: Stanford’s Anderson Collection

by Carol Strickland The Anderson Collection at Stanford University, designed by Richard Olcott of Ennead Architects. Photo Tim Griffith.  ADVERTISEMENT Stanford University, a hub of innovative entrepreneurship in Silicon Valley and the origin of the “sharing economy” (think Uber and Airbnb), is now home to a magnificent example of art sharing. The Anderson Collection, a new museum that is part of Stanford’s pu…

On Elite Campuses, an Arts Race