Picassos in Poughkeepsie

Art at Vassar’s Frances Lehman Loeb Art Center

Take a right off of Raymond Ave. in Poughkeepsie, and you’ll find a large room showcasing multiple Picassos, a Jackson Pollock, a Degas sculpture, and more. 

Here in the Hudson Valley, you wouldn’t expect to find pieces from artists whose work is found in places like the MET. However, the Frances Lehman Loeb Art Center at Vassar College is a hidden home for pieces by some of the world’s most renowned artists.

“Like many college museums, we benefit from alumni generosity. All of those heavy hitters are pretty much donations to us,” Margaret Vetare, Curator of Education at the art gallery said. “That’s how those amazing works come to be in our collection in a relatively small museum.

Vassar has a significant art budget; but, of course, it’s nowhere near large enough to purchase works made by the likes of Picasso. According to Vetare, many of the women who attended Vassar in the early 20th century went on to become avid art collectors, and donated the pieces to Vassar once it was time to disperse their art collections.

“We’re known pretty well for our 20th century collection, and also for our collection of Hudson River School paintings. Those are paintings that were made, many of them of our local scenery, in the 1800s,” Vetare said. “They’ve been here since the college was founded in the 1860s.”

In total, the art gallery currently has over 21,000 contemporary and historical pieces, and is open to the public. Walk through the stone archway at Vassar’s main entrance, turn to the right, and walk down a glass-encased hallway into the Loeb Art Center.

In the main gallery you’ll find more paintings and sculptures than you’d expect in the seemingly-small museum. Walk a bit further and you’ll find the gallery’s current exhibition, “The Shape of Light: Defining Photographs,” showcasing over 4,500 photographs. “One area where we’ve been growing a lot is in our photography collection. We’ve got over 4,000 photographs, so that is an area that’s grown exponentially in the past 10 years,” Vetare said. 

Whether you’re an art aficionado or you’re just looking for something fun to do this weekend, take a trip to Vassar’s art museum. Spend an afternoon gazing at Picasso’s Verre, Guitar, Partition, admiring Matisse’s Roses de Noel at Saxifrage, or staring at Miró’s Painting (Birds, Personages and Blue Star). If photographs are more your speed, “The Shape of Light” is on display until the end of the semester, along with the exhibition “Movement Captured: Dance in Art.” There’s something for everyone—plus, admission is free.