Florida’s Norton Museum of Art has launched a new partnership with Chanel, which will sponsor three of the West Palm Beach museum’s resident artists this year. The luxury fashion brand will also sponsor a party for the painter Shara Hughes, who completed her residency at the Norton earlier this month, as well as an exhibition of her paintings, ceramics and works on paper at the museum, opening in November.
The Norton’s residency programme began in 2019, following its $100m Norman Foster-designed expansion. Every year, curators invite four artists to spend up to eight weeks in historic houses near the Norton that the museum renovated for this purpose; these serve as residents’ living quarters and studio spaces. At the moment, only US citizens and green-card holders can participate, but the museum’s director, Ghislain d’Humières, hopes to open that up soon.
“This is one of the few residencies in the US welcoming both family and pets,” D’Humières tells The Art Newspaper. He says that part of the goal of the programme is for resident artists to interact with local artists and “find inspiration in the beauty of Florida”. Although not required, the Norton encourages residents to lead an educational programme for local kids, have a public artist talk and meet with collectors and donors.
As for how a fashion brand got involved, “we approached Chanel for our gala”, D’Humières says, “but they said they were more interested in the residency”. In the past several years, Chanel has expanded its sponsorship of programming at museums and other arts institutions around the world—including at New York’s Museum of Modern Art, the Centre Pompidou in Paris and Shanghai’s Power Station of Art.
The other two artist residents benefitting from the Chanel sponsorship are the photographer and sculptor Leslie Hewitt, who will open a concurrent solo show at the Norton in August, and the painter Jas Knight. D’Humières notes that Knight is especially interested in and inspired by the Old Masters, whose work features prominently in the Norton’s collection.