CLEVELAND, Ohio — A new $25-million gift from the Kelvin and Eleanor Smith Foundation will enable the Cleveland Museum of Art to strengthen exhibitions, restore and preserve its Fine Arts Garden and tackle other big objectives.
The museum announced Wednesday that Ellen Stirn Mavec, chair of the institution’s board of trustees, made the gift, one of the largest in the museum’s recent history, through her role as president of the Kelvin and Eleanor Smith Foundation.
Mavec has served on the Smith foundation’s board since 1982 and became its president and chair in 1997. The foundation was established by Mavec’s grandfather, Kelvin Smith, a co-founder of Lubrizol.
The museum quoted Mavec in a news release as having described the donation as a vote of confidence in William Griswold, the museum’s director since 2014.
“The Cleveland Museum of Art has always been a source of inspiration for my family, and that sentiment has only grown under Bill Griswold’s leadership,” Mavec said.
The $25-million donation is divided into four segments. Of the total, $15 million will be managed as a special fund for exhibitions. Another $2.5 million will be used to restore, protect and preserve the outdoor sculptures in the museum’s Zodiac Garden and Fountain of the Waters, created by sculptor Chester Beach.
Two other elements in the $25 million donation were previously disclosed in other announcements. They include $5 million to permanently fund the position of curator of decorative arts, now held by Ada De Wit, formerly of the Wallace Collection in London, and $2.5 million devoted to the $8 million refurbishment of the museum’s North Lobby, now underway.
The position held by Ada de Wit at the Cleveland Museum of Art has been designated the Ellen S. and Bruce V. Mavec Curator of Decorative Arts in recognition of a $5 million from board chair, Ellen Stirn Mavec, made through The Kelvin and Eleanor Smith FoundationHoward Agriesti
The museum characterized the $25 million donation as a challenge grant. Although the largesse doesn’t come with a specific dollar-for-dollar formula, Griswold said, “we do anticipate we will match every bit of this gift, in each of the four areas” specified for its use.
In fact, Griswold said, “It was in part in response to Ellen’s commitment to the lobby project that it is now fully funded at about $8 million.”
Mavec’s previous large donations to the museum have included $22.5 million, which helped pay for the museum’s $320 million expansion and renovation, completed in 2013.
Other large donations to the museum in recent decades include more than $23.3 million given by Dealer Tire CEO Scott Mueller between 2009 and 2015, and $20 million donated by the Ames Family Foundation in 2008, in honor of which the museum named the central atrium built as part of its expansion and renovation.
Griswold said the Mavec gift will help the museum realize goals outlined in its 2017 Strategic Plan and the 2022 update of that document.
The $2.5 million devoted to outdoor spaces south of the museum’s 1916 building will help pay for the first two phases of a long-term, $20 million project to upgrade the museum’s south steps and terrace and the 13-acre Fine Arts Garden.
Ellen Mavec, a longtime Cleveland Museum of Art trustee, has been elected chair of the board.Howard Agresti, courtesy Cleveland Museum of Art
The museum occupies 13.5 acres donated by museum co-founder Jeptha Wade II. It leases and manages other former Wade properties owned by the City of Cleveland, including 6.5 acres along Doan Brook, the 4 acres of the Nord Greenway, which cuts across its front lawn, and the Fine Arts Garden, which includes Wade Lagoon.
The first phases of work in the Fine Arts Garden will include cleaning and conservation treatment for the Zodiac Garden, which features 12 stone columns with sculptures representing each sign of the zodiac. The columns curve around the central “Fountain of the Waters,” which is flanked by two figurative sculptures.
Griswold said that other improvements funded by the Mavec gift will include minor repairs and upgrades to the museum’s South Terrace and steps designed to make the spaces more accessible under goals set by the Americans with Disabilities Act. The museum also wants to create an outdoor dining area at the southwest corner of the 1916 building, possibly by 2026, Griswold said.
The $15 million devoted to exhibitions, which Griswold said he hopes the museum will be able to match with other donations, will give the museum flexibility to fund research, travel, insurance, shipping and exhibition design across multiple fiscal years it takes to plan major international loan shows.
“The exhibition program is our most visible program, and certainly one of our most important programs as a driver of attendance,’’ Griswold said. “We are known internationally for the caliber of our exhibition, which benefit the entire community that we serve and anyone who comes to the museum. It is a hugely and increasingly expensive program.’’
Griswold said that as of last fall, the museum’s endowment had surpassed $1 billion, but that the total continues to fluctuate above and below that level. The museum’s 2017 Strategic Plan called for increasing the endowment to $1.25 billion by 2027, a goal Griswold said the institution should be able to reach.
He emphasized that of all the benefits provided by the museum’s wealth, the most important is that it enables the museum to maintain free general admission.
“It’s important for everyone to remember that just about the most expensive thing you can do as a museum is to be free, so thank goodness we have it,” Griswold said, referring to the endowment.