November 21, 2008
Museums
The best museums in Oregon are an odd lot. My favorite is the Benson Museum at Malheur National Wildlife Refuge in Harney County: small, simple and magical.
Other favorites include the Hallie Ford Museum of Art at Willamette University in Salem. A small art museum at a small private school, the Hallie Ford (named after the first wife of a Roseburg timber baron, Kenneth W. Ford) is a leader in collecting and showing Northwest painting of the 20th and 21st centuries.
The Portland Art Museum did a good job of mounting popular blockbuster shows under its now-former director, John Buchanan. It remains to be seen what the future holds there.
The Jordan Schnitzer Museum of Art at the University of Oregon has an extensive collection of Asian art and a large collection of work, though only a few top rate pieces, by Northwest mystic painter Morris Graves.
OMSI -- the Oregon Museum of Science and Industry in Portland -- is fun for children.
Photo: Benson Museum at Malheur Refuge
all text and images © 2005-06 by Bob Keefer
no reproduction allowed in any form without written permission