We are saddened to announce the passing of Betsy Wyeth, who died Tuesday, April 20. The Farnsworth Art Museum shared the following in a recent newsletter:

Betsy Wyeth’s association with the Farnsworth goes back to 1944, when the museum purchased six works from an as-yet-unknown artist Andrew Wyeth out of the Macbeth Gallery in New York City. Mrs. Wyeth has been a supporter of the museum throughout the Farnsworth’s public existence. She will be greatly missed.

Betsy Wyeth was born on September 26, 1921 and was raised in East Aurora, New York. The daughter of Merle and Elizabeth (Bess) James, she grew up in an art-friendly environment, with her mother interested in the performing arts and her father the rotogravure editor for the Buffalo Courier-Express. It was in July of 1939 that she met the painter Andrew Wyeth and accompanied him to a dance in Rockland, Maine, a few days later, where he asked her to marry him. Though they had known each other for one week, she accepted.

“Betsy Wyeth was much more than a passionate supporter of this institution,” commented Farnsworth Director Christopher J. Brownawell. “She was a dear friend. Her love of the midcoast was felt far beyond the reaches of the art world. Her generosity extended to the island residents, the fisherman, and the people of Maine. Through her support of the museum, we have been able to exhibit countless of her late husband’s works throughout the past decades for the enjoyment of our local, national, and international visitors. We extend our most sincere condolences to the family. Betsy Wyeth will be greatly missed by the Farnsworth’s board of trustees and the entire staff.”

From their very first day together, when Betsy took Andrew to the Olson House to meet Christina and Alvaro Olson, Betsy played an essential role in Andrew’s career. She was a major source of strength for the artist at the very outset of their relationship when Andrew could easily have settled for the comfort of his early successful work. She provided the support that allowed him to follow his artistic vision while dealing with pressure from dealers, patrons, critics, and his father, N.C. Through their years together, she served as Andy’s model, inspiration, advisor, curator, editor, and business manager.

Her generosity and vision have also had a lasting impact on Maine’s midcoast, and beyond. She served an inspirational and in fact pivotal role in the founding of the Island Institute, dedicated to sustaining and preserving Maine’s island and remote coastal communities. Her creation of Up East Foundation led to the preservation of a seventeen-acre property that was once part of the Olsons’ saltwater farm, the place that inspired some 300 of Andrew Wyeth’s works, including his iconic 1948 painting, “Christina’s World.” In addition, the direction of the Farnsworth’s exhibition program was enhanced when in 1998 it opened the Wyeth Center and the Wyeth Study Center, galleries devoted to showing the work of N.C., Andrew, and Jamie Wyeth. Supported by generous loans from the collection of Andrew and Betsy Wyeth, these exhibitions have reached audiences from around the world.

Art Historian William Gerdts (b. 1929) died April 14, 2020 of complications of COVID-19.

From the New York Times:

Bill was a distinguished scholar and teacher of the history of American painting and sculpture of the 18th, 19th, and earlier 20th century. He was professor in the Ph.D. Program in Art History, City University of New York Graduate Center from 1971 to assuming Professor Emeritus status in 1999, when his career was far from over.

Bill graduated from Amherst College in February 1949. He filled the seven month gap before he could take up his admission to Harvard Law School employed in preparing Amherst’s significant collection of American art for the move to the new Mead museum building, and finding his calling. Four days of law classes were enough for him to decide on the immediate change in registration to Harvard’s Graduate School of Arts and Sciences art history department.

His first serious professional position following resident graduate study was curator of paintings and sculpture, The Newark (NJ) Museum, 1954-1966, a time when historical American art was just beginning to attain scholarly and commercial respect. He reveled in the chance to enlarge and shape the Museum’s already important American collection.

Bill received his doctorate degree from Harvard in 1966, which opened the opportunity to teach at university level. His first academic appointment was as associate professor of art history at the University of Maryland, College Park, where he remained for three years. But Bill never liked to be far from New York. He returned in 1969 to enjoy a stint as Vice President for Research at the Coe Kerr Gallery, before joining the faculty of the newly created CUNY graduate program in art history. The program was exceptional in its focus on the study of American art, still an exotic academic choice.

Besides teaching, Bill was a frequent guest lecturer or exhibition curator for museum and universities around the country, and occasionally, abroad. His record of publication was prodigious: at least one title every year from 1954 through 2019. There are journal articles, reviews, essays in exhibition catalogues, and some 25 major books, a number which became the definitive study of its subject.

He was an acknowledged authority on American Neo-Classical sculpture; American still life painting; the early 19th century painters Washington Allston and Henry Inman; and the American Impressionist movement.

A summary definition of Bill’s career might be the title of his three volume study “Art Across America. Two Centuries of Regional Painting: 1710-1920,” (Abbeville Press, 1990).

An almost inevitable accessory to his dedication to study and teaching was development of a comprehensive professional library. It filled the New York apartment shared with Abigail, his wife and professional colleague of 43 years. One of the satisfactions of his life was opening it to students or researchers of a wide range of interest directly or tangentially concerned with the history of American art. The library and a selection of their collection of American art was given to the National Gallery of Art in 2018.

Bill received many honors, including the degrees Doctor of Humane Letters from Amherst College in 1992, and Doctor of Fine Arts from Syracuse University in 1996. However, his greatest pride was in his doctoral students who have gone on to influential positions as teachers, curators and advisers at colleges, universities, museums and galleries around the country.

Besides his wife, Abigail, Bill is survived by his first wife and constant friend, Elaine Evans Dee; their son Jeffrey Dee and his wife, Susan; granddaughter Joanna Dee Das and husband Koushik; grandson, James and wife, Pyper; and great-grand- children Keerthan and Jaya.