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.

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

Exhibition

Manuel Neri: Assertion of the Figure

The Catalogues

Family Programs

News

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

Instead of Changing Leaves, Peep Eight Bay Area Art Shows this Fall

…at was curated by Christian L. Frock and Tanya Zimbardo, Public Works: Artists’ Interventions 1970s – Now brings together a group of female artists working in the public realm. Believing not all public art is monumental and not all monumental art is truly impactful,Public Works focuses on temporary interventions online and in the urban environment. The list of participating artists — too lengthy to mention here — is an impressive one, including o…

News

‘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…

News

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

…understand the challenges faced by the museum team in their daily work, and areas in which staff want the museum to grow and flourish.” And how do they plan to address the issues raised last summer? “We are working closely with the staff with goals of transparency, empowerment and open communications,” according to Brezinski. For Mitchell, that means talking regularly with staff “to understand what tools and information th…

News

New acquisition by David Park on view at the Anderson Collection

…Park (1911-60). The painting will be on view when the museum reopens on Sept. 22, 2021. “I am extremely grateful to Keith Jantzen and Scott Beth for their generous gift to the Anderson Collection,” said Jason Linetzky, director of the museum. “The addition of this work focuses renewed attention on David Park, a compassionate artist and educator whose inventive spirit and camaraderie with artists forever transformed the landscape of figurative pai…

News

Contemplations on modern art

…ey character: a little lost, a little gloomy, a little unsure about the decisions I have been making. So, I went to the Anderson Collection on a Saturday morning by myself, because museums have a calming effect on me. I needed to find my center again. As I entered the Anderson Collection, I climbed up the stairs to reach the permanent collection. I was in the middle of a room surrounded by large canvases of colors. One of them, covering almost th…

Hostile Terrain 94
Exhibition

Hostile Terrain 94

Exhibition

Eamon Ore-Giron: Non Plus Ultra

News

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

…1; 1983) and Robert Hudson (“Plumb Bob” 1982). They are fun and lively, and perhaps lead the visitor to think that all the mystery about modern art is exaggerated. But then the grand staircase, which takes the visitor to the second floor where the majority of the art is installed, leads directly to an encounter with Clyfford Still’s “1957-J No.1.” The work is an interesting choice for such a focal point; large in sc…

News

A New Museum for Stanford—and a New Neighbor for Us!

…Collection building opened at the Palo Alto campus of Stanford University—our frequent partner-in-crime when it comes to celebrating the West. Designed by the same team that created Stanford’s stellar Bing Concert Hall, the structure houses 121 works of modern and contemporary American art, all donated by Harry W. and Mary Margaret Anderson. Of course, we’re most excited about the pieces that have a Western flavor: three lovely Diebenkorns, a Th…

News

Top 10 art shows as rising rents force out S.F. artists

…d for another year, a temporary but very dark spot on a dimming artistic landscape, looking ever less hospitable to creative adventure. Other local institutional programs, meanwhile, provided a spectrum of diversions to the wider public. High: By any reckoning, the year’s high point had to be the opening of the Anderson Collection at Stanford University, permanent access to a cache of defining postwar American artworks. Low: Bay Area Now 7, Yerba…

News

Anderson Collection a modern art trove not to be missed

…out much direction, until they met two people on (the Stanford) campus: Al Elsen and Nathan Oliveira.” According to Linetzky, Elsen, who was a professor of art history, encouraged the Andersons to look at master works, to go to the Museum of Modern Art in New York and see examples by the likes of Jackson Pollock and Mark Rothko. Oliveira, a painter and Stanford instructor, “brought them into his studio and really showed them what it meant to crea…

News

Fashion statements: Nick Cave’s Soundsuits come to Stanford

…ht-provoking and challenging suits are constructed in ways that refuse to reveal gender, age or race. They offer complete anonymity. To imagine yourself in them is to turn the collective sharing of memories into a personal epiphany. The Anderson exhibit includes eight Soundsuits, three video works and a recently completed documentary about Nick Cave titled “Here.” There also is an interactive felt wall where visitors to the gallery ca…

News

A new lust for art takes hold in Silicon Valley

…te,” focusing on works depicting the national park that the 79-year-old artist created with an iPad. In addition to New York, where it is headquartered, Pace has galleries in London, Beijing, Hong Kong and Seoul. It may seem like San Francisco, rather than Palo Alto, would make sense to add to that list. But not so, says Glimcher. “There was no significant presence by a commercial gallery in Silicon Valley,” he explains. “When an amazing thing co…

News

Getting it down on paper: A different aspect of the Anderson Collection on view

…k is featured at Anderson Collection’s latest exhibition. Image courtesy of Anderson Collection. Visitors to the Anderson Collection at Stanford University can experience a wide range of art movements (virtually every major development after 1945) and media. The museum founders, Hunk and Moo Anderson, did not collect photography but nearly every other means of artistic expression are represented, including works on paper. The museum is shi…

News

Mary Margaret ‘Moo’ Anderson, modern art collector and benefactor, dead at 92

…to a friend named Moose. He heard her name as “Moo Moo” not “Murma” and it was Moo from that point on, according to her granddaughter Devin Pence. Hunk and Moo were married in 1950. By then Anderson and two partners had started a venture to improve dormitory food service and it soon expanded across the country. The company, Saga Corp., moved to Menlo Park, which is what brought the Andersons west in 1964. The company went public in the 1970s and…