Harry W. Anderson
BornOctober 5, 1922
Corning, New York
DiedFebruary 7, 2018(2018-02-07) (aged 95)
NationalityAmerican
Other namesHunk Anderson
EducationHobart and William Smith Colleges
Occupation(s)Businessman, art collector, philanthropist
SpouseMary Margaret "Moo" Ransford (m. 1950–2018; death)
Children1
Harry W. Anderson's wife Mary Margaret "Moo" Anderson at 3EP Ltd. Press (June 1981)

Harry W. Anderson, also known as Hunk Anderson, (October 5, 1922 – February 7, 2018) was an American businessman, art collector and philanthropist. He was the co-founder of Saga Foods Co., a food company for college dormitories. With his wife, Mary Margaret Anderson, he donated works of art to the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art and to the Iris & B. Gerald Cantor Center for Visual Arts at Stanford University.

Early life and career

Anderson was born on October 5, 1922, in Corning, New York.[1][2] He was a first-generation American, as his father was born in Sweden and his mother in Norway.[2] Anderson played football in high school, and it was then that he took the nickname "Hunk", after Heartley Anderson.[3] He graduated from Hobart and William Smith Colleges.[1]

Anderson co-founded Saga Foods Co.,[3] a food company for college dormitories, while he was still in college.[1] The company moved into an office on Sand Hill Road.[1] It made "more than 400 million meals a year across the United States" in 1973,[4] and it became a public company in the same decade, until it merged with Marriott.[1]

Art collection and donations

With his wife, Anderson became a significant art collector in the 1960s. They first collected works of art by Claude Monet, Pablo Picasso, Camille Pissarro, Henri Matisse, Emile Nolde, Arthur Dove, Georgia O'Keeffe, and Marsden Hartley.[2][4] They subsequently purchased works by Alexander Calder, Vija Celmins, Richard Diebenkorn, Jean Dubuffet, Sam Francis, Alberto Giacometti, Adolph Gottlieb, David Hockney, Jasper Johns, Willem de Kooning, Joan Mitchell, Jackson Pollock, Martin Puryear, Saul Steinberg, Clyfford Still and Wayne Thiebaud.[3][4]

By 2000, the Andersons had donated works from their collection by Jim Dine, Roy Lichtenstein, Robert Rauschenberg, Frank Stella, and Andy Warhol to the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art.[4] Between October 7, 2000, and January 15, 2001, the museum hosted Celebrating Modern Art: The Anderson Collection, an exhibition over three floors of "more than 300 paintings, sculptures and drawings by nearly 140 artists."[5]

Other works donated by the Andersons went to the Oakland Museum of California, the San Jose Museum of Art, and the Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco.[4] In 2014, the Andersons donated 121 works of art to the Iris & B. Gerald Cantor Center for Visual Arts at Stanford University.[2] They included paintings by Philip Guston, Franz Kline, Mark Rothko, and David Smith.[1][4]

Personal life and death

Anderson married Mary Margaret "Moo" Ransford in July 1950.[1] Moo Anderson was active in the local arts, and between 1978 and 1984, she was a co-owner of 3EP Ltd. Press in Palo Alto, California.[6] They had a daughter, Mary Patricia, and they resided in Menlo Park, California.[1] Harry Anderson died on February 7, 2018.[1]

References

  1. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 Whiting, Sam (February 8, 2018). "Harry 'Hunk' Anderson, modern art collector and philanthropist, dies at 95". San Francisco Chronicle. Retrieved November 30, 2018.
  2. 1 2 3 4 Wander, Robin (February 8, 2018). "Art collector and Stanford donor Harry "Hunk" Anderson dies at 95". Stanford News. Retrieved November 30, 2018.
  3. 1 2 3 Baker, Kenneth (October 1, 2000). "A Family of Art Lovers That Collects Quirky Nicknames". The San Francisco Examiner. p. 308. Retrieved December 3, 2018 – via Newspapers.com.
  4. 1 2 3 4 5 6 "Journey to the new: Property from The Collection of Harry W. and Mary Margaret Anderson". Christie's. November 5, 2018. Retrieved November 30, 2018.
  5. ↑ "Celebrating Modern Art The Anderson Collection". San Francisco Museum of Modern Art. Retrieved December 3, 2018.
  6. ↑ "A Finding Aid to the 3EP Ltd. records, 1970-1984, bulk 1979-1984". Archives of American Art, Smithsonian Institution. Retrieved 2021-07-24.

Further reading

  • Garrels, Gary, ed. (2000). Celebrating Modern Art: The Anderson Collection. Berkeley, California: University of California Press. ISBN 9780520227606. OCLC 803676519.
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