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The Permanent Collection at Danforth Art consists of approximately 3,500 objects in all media. The Museum has been building the collection since its founding in 1975, and actively collects and holds examples of American Art in all media from the early nineteenth century to the present day.

Danforth Art Museum’s mission is to collect, document, preserve, display, and interpret original works of art and the resources in its care in order to uphold and advance the academic goals and core values of Framingham State University and to enrich the community at large. The museum seeks to educate and inspire students, faculty, and the public through access, engaging exhibitions, and educational programming.

The collection includes familiar names from American art history as well as significant holdings of contemporary regional art from both established and emerging artists.

Below, explore a selection of these works more deeply in this online gallery. For more information about the work, please click on the thumbnail version of the artwork below to open a page from our collections database.

Viewing our collection:
Figuration in American Art
New England Academic Traditions
Painting in Boston
Contemporary, Regional Art

Figuration in American Art

Painting of a man from the knees up, wearing a blue collard shirt and a black leather apron and gloves. He is light skinned, blue eyed, and short brown hair, looking diagonally to the left. Behind him are various steel working objects and a large crane moving metal objects in a hazy environment.
Garrit A. Beneker, Man at Steelworks
Realistic painting of an older white man with short white hair and a ruddy complextion. He is depicted from the chest up, wearing a black coat with wide lapels and a white undershirt. The background is primarily solid brown-red.
Gilbert Stuart, Dr. Nathaniel Coffin
Woman in a red dress standing on a grey table amongst various foods and serve ware with a white cat at the top right corner of the table.
Haley Hasler, Self-Portrait as a Woman Serving a Meal
Painting of a man with yellow-peach skin, wearing a deep brown-green jacket. He has wide, narrow eyes and short grey-white hair.
Jon Imber, Portrait of Philip Guston in a Green Coat
Portrait painting of an older woman, seated from the waist up, with light skin, wearing a brown empire dress and tan shawl and lacy top. Her light brown hair is under a white lacy cap.
Gilbert Stuart, Mrs. Nathaniel Coffin
Abstract portrait painting of a face looking straight out, with light skin, short red hair, yellow painted lips, and red and blue eyelashes. The face has deep shadows on the cheeks and forehead, and the background is a similar shade to the person's skin color.
Susanna Coffey, Self-Portrait (Reverse Head, Sepia)
Portrait painting of an older woman from the waist up, seated, wearing a fir coat, several layers of clothing in red, blue, and white. She is light skinned, looking out at the audience, and her grey hair is up under a blue cap.
Florence Hosmer, Woman with Blue Cloche Hat
Expressionist portrait painting of a dark skinned woman looking off in profile to the right. Her short hair is under a head wrapping, and she is wearing a maroon top in front of a grey-blue background.
Nathan Goldstein, Jackie
Portrait painting of a woman in 19th century clothing, with a white ruffled neck and lacy bonnet with blue ribbons. Her black hair is pinned up in curls and she has a wide gold belt buckle at her waist and a red shawl around one arm.
Albert Gallatin Hoit, Mrs. Hannah Parsons Keegan
Portrait panting of a light skinned woman, seated, facing to the right, wearing a plain yellow dress with decorated sleeves. Her hair his blond and curled under and she is holding a paper in her hands.
Ivan Gregorovitch Olinsky, Pleasing News
Portrait painting of a man in a 19th century black suit with tall neck. He is seated with a red curtain behind him to the right. He is facing to the left looking out at the audience, with short balding hair.
Chester Harding, Portrait of Abel Phelps
Portrait painting of a man with light skin and brown hair. His face is elongated and shadowed, and he is wearing a green blazer top, with one arm up at his chest holding a paintbrush.
Jack Kramer, Self Portrait

New England Academic Traditions

Painting of six women of various ages in black dresses and white caps seated by an old stone building along a dirt road.
Charles Sprague Pearce, A Village Funeral at Brittany
Painting of a woman in a very wide, ornate gold frame. The woman is standing in front of a red and gold background. She has pale skin, hair piled up on her head, and is wearing a glittering black dress with a transparent gold shawl around her shoulders.
Phillip Leslie Hale, Glitter
Painting of an attic space with an angled wood beam ceiling. The room is a deep tan, and there is a woman, seated facing right, looking at a small mirror. She is wearing a yellow dress and behind her on the opposite wall are dresses and a hat hanging around a rectangular mirror propped up on a table.
Marion L. Pooke, The One Night Stand
Zoomed in detail of an abstract bird shape in gold and black outlines on a grey-black smooth background.
Grace Hartigan, Cellini Cup
Still life painting with a deep brown textured background. There are four pieces of worn, tan paper with different symbols and writing on the fronts. Across are four different sized keys hanging vertically at different heights. On the right half of the painting are three brown leaves.
Conger Metcalf, Deception with Keys (Inganno con Chiave)
Realistic landscape painting of a calm body of water with a sloping spit of land on the far right with red and orange trees. In the background are tall rounded mountains and a blue sky with gold and purple clouds.
Jasper Francis Cropsey, Lake George
Realistic landscape painting with a stony outcrop on the front left and a slop of red grass to the right. There are pine trees behind this followed by a far off view of fields and trees, two ponds, and rounded mountains with a clouded sky.
Albert Bierstadt, Near North Conway, New Hampshire
Portrait painting of a cream skinned man, seated, wearing a grey suit. He has short dark hair and a large beard. One hand is in his pants pocket while the other is leaning on a desk next to the chair that has papers and a nude figurine on top.
William Paxton, Portrait of the Artist’s Father
Portrait painting of a woman in a high necked white shirt, black bow at her neck, and a black hat seated in a green chair. Her brown hair is pinned up under her head with cream skin and calm expression while looking downward.
Marion L. Pooke, Portrait Study in Profile
Winter landscape painting with a snow covered ground and a leafless tree. Behind it is a collection of pine trees. Towards the top center behind the main tree is the hint of the sun with a wide glare ring around it.
Robert Woodward, Storm Sun
Expressionist painting of a dreary winter scene. The sky and ground are mottled shades of grey with a large leafless tree in the foreground. In the background are a few groupings of two story yellow houses with red chimneys.
Max Weber, Untitled (Winter Scene)
Drawing of woman in top hat holding a cane, with arm around a horses neck
Edmund Charles Tarbell, Mary and Newcastle Poppy
Abstract landscape painting of a harbor with a small dock and sail boat in the foreground. Behind is a sandbar with some grass and rocks. The background is flat with a light blue and yellow sky.
Charles Hopkinson, Nausham Island
Realistic landscape painting with green and brown ground and a small pond on the bottom left. Behind this are a few groupings of trees, windblown, with a white and grey stormy sky.
John Joseph Enneking, Landscape

Painting in Boston

Three images of a woman in a long purple robe in the kitchen cooking at a stovetop
Suzanne Hodes, Mother Three Times
Abstract painting of swirls of colors, primarily in tans, whites, and black, with a hint of blues and reds at the top center and top right.
Natalie Alper, Votive Song
Red-orange background with a large hand holding up a very small baby in a white onesie.
Barbara Swan, Baby (Aaron at Four Months)
Painting of a mass of blue and red fishes devouring each other in the ocean.
Hyman Bloom, Seascape II
Picasso styled painting with flat, geometric shapes in white, red, pink, blue, and hints of yellow that roughly make an image of a flat figure with wide almond eyes.
Karl Zerbe, Archaic Figure
Painting of a red flat landscape with four blue crescents with green trees and yellow sky in the background.
Lois Tarlow, As The North River Meets the Sea
Painting of a soft yellow flat background with blue and purple glass bottles spaced evenly apart in a grid pattern, filled halfway with water. Nest to each alternating are lemons or limes, and the shadows are blue going out to the right.
Barbara Swan, Lemons and Limes
Painting with a stained glass window feel. The background is smears of bright red, orange, blue, and green with a netted pattern across in black. There are vertical bars in black connected with arched tops throughout. In the center is a figure made of blues, teals, and yellows of a woman with a flowing skirt and hair, holding a long necked stringed instrument and a bow in each hand.
Esther Geller, Rebec Player
Abstract expressionist painting with a deep black background with hints of white and teal at the top right and red at the bottom left. There are faces in white and teal emerging from the scene, but in half ghostly forms or odd angles.
Hyman Bloom, Séance II
Vertical skinny painting with a dark black-blue background and an abstract skeleton in a flimsy red dress.
Hyman Bloom, Skeleton in a Red Dress
Abstract cityscape painting with red, orange, and yellow buildings all askew. There are figures walking in the streets in front of the old styled city buildings. The sky is shades of red, white, and black.
Lawrence Kupferman, South End Facade
Painting in primary colors of red, yellow, and blue. There is a wide swath of yellow on the bottom half with scattered branches with blue leaves around a red robed figure holding the branches. The figure has long brown hair, a calm face, and a hint of a beard.
Arthur Polonsky, The Flowering Staff of Aaron
Abstract expressionist painting of a young boy kneeling and leaning over a chair, gripping the back rungs of the chair and head pressed against the back. There is a table behind him, against a green paneled wall with a landscape painting above. To the far right is a blue lined section like a long heavy curtain.
Steven Trefonides, The Spell
Abstract painting of three child-like figures, two playing stringed instruments, in front of a green background with black squares scattered throughout.
David Aronson, Three Musicians IV
Abstract painting of an interior room with grey walls with streaks of yellow and blue. There is an orange bed to the left, a man in a grey suit reading a paper seated in the center next to a window. To the right are two tables, a brown dog, and a painting just visible hanging on the wall.
Harley Manlius Perking, Interior

Contemporary, Regional Art

A busy painting contained within a painted red chalkboard frame. There are zooming objects such as buildings, bread, utensils, grey bars, and fruit.
Gerry Bergstein, Blackboard #2
Sculpture mounted from a ceiling corner with brown, pink, and yellow oozing protrusions, and dangling yellow and blue pieces of clay and fabric.
Sarah Meyers Brent, Seep
Interior room with red tiled floor and yellow walls. A woman sits at a table on the left, a boy stands in the center, and another figure just visible is bathing himself in a tub.
Richard Foster Yarde, The Apartment
Photograph of a woman from the back, wearing in a pleated black dress. She is seated on a black chair with one hand behind touching grass that has been placed on the chair seat.
Toni Pepe, Installment 6 from “the Gesture of Tradition”
Photograph of a 1950s car tail light, with a bright blue body, angled tail end and jutting out red break lights.
Sean Sullivan, 1959 Cadillac Series 62
Lithograph of a humanoid bunny leaping in the air and colored a rusty red. The background is a smudged yellow-orange with many sketched shapes and figures, including deer, trees, Colonial fife and drum line, and houses.
Jaune Quick-to-See Smith, 40,000 Years
Zoomed in picture of a painting made with wide palette strokes of a woman with light skin and short curly black hair reclining on an ornate couch with wood outlines and a floral quilted fabric. The woman has her eyes closed and one hand up on the back of the couch. She is wearing a pink-red short dress and her legs are fading into the couch.
Mia Cross, Another Girl Who Sat on the Couch Too Long
Print of all blues with capital letter writing across the background. In the foreground is a light skinned woman in a big blue dress holding a paint brush.
May Stevens, Artemisia Gentileschi
Painting of two young girls leaning on a table. There are various toys and craft items floating around them and on the table. The background is pitch black.
Don Eddy, C/VI/D (Then There Were Two)
Painting in a black frame and red panel background with artists palette glue to the front. The palette is painted with a scene of an artist studio, all in wood and shades of brown, with a arched window on the left, the artist seated in the center at an easel painting, and a table, doorway, and small wooden figurine to the right.
Randall Diehl , Dutch Painter
Photograph of a connected pair of yellow-white headstones with 'Father' on the left and 'Mother' on the right. The ground is covered in snow.
Sarah Pollman, Father/Mother 5
Silhouette of a strapless dress on a yellow background
Lindsey Beal, Figure #1 from ‘The Venus Series’
Sculpture resting on a metal platform hanging on the wall. There are white railings cut towards the bottom with old paint rollers between the railings, wrapped in plastic with old photographs of girls printed on them.
Anne Lambert, Four Mill Girls
Painting done in vertical wide stripes of a yellow hat with a red feather in the black band around the hand and a wide yellow brim. The background is black with stripes of green and the ground is a bright green. There are hints of orange in a few blocks across the canvas.
Aaron Fink, Hat
Painting of exotic flower on the left half and a colorful parrot on a branch on the upper right. The background is swirling whites, blues, and reds.
Nina Bohlen, Jabez Dreams
Abstract drawing with a sketched background with rough floral shapes emerging and slight colors of brown and red. In the center vertically is a large structure, like a skinny tree with wide top, the stem is black and the top is deep red and black.
Cynthia Maurice, La Boheme
Artwork with a deep black background and an oblong, blobbed white shape in the center with three black circles inside that give it a look of a face.
Jo Sandman, Light Tracing #9
Flat metal sculpture of a woman in a tall square hat and robes, seated holding a nude baby with a hale behind him.
Allan Rohan Crite, Madonna and Child
Abstract painting with a deep blue background and green vertical bars towards the bottom. In the background are plus signs etched out in white. Across the center in three rows are orchid flowers in white.
Anne Neely, Night Garden
A realistic painting on a flat sand colored surface. In the center is an amass of cut in half fish and red and blue eels with their blood and guts staining the surface.
Tara Sellios, Retribution: Untitled No. 1
Photograph of three heads in white on a white shelf with a grey background. The center head has a yellow headband with a bow on its head.
TRIIIBE (Alicia Casilio, Kelly Casilio, Sara Casilio, Cary Wolinsky), Shelf Life #3
Photograph of a pink-cream blouse, close up focusing on the arm. The short sleeve and armpit are all ragged and shredded. The background is pitch black.
Gail Samuelson, Silk Blouse
Painting with a dripping green-brown background over printed papers. In the center is a t shaped design in three layers of blue with stars and a round logo in the middle with a fox jumping under a moon.
Jaune Quick-to-See Smith, Sovereign Nations
Photograph of a sculpture, with a textured orange wall and floor, and a woman in the same textured orange skin seated on a textured orange stool wearing a blue dress. Her arms are crossed in front of her chest.
Sandy Skoglund, Spirituality in the Flesh
Photograph of five oval works on a green wall, Four works are white with ghostly images, the fifth is brown with a white center.
Duane Slick, The Mind/Body Problem
Painting of a flat background of reds and hint of blue in the upper right and a ground of blue-white. In the center is a tall building leaning to the left with an explosion of fire coming out from the center.
Robert Ferrandini, Untitled
Photograph on tan paper with printed text repeating 'Dick Played with Jane. Jane Played with Dick" surrounding a photograph of four young African American children holding hands. They are surrounded by a wide red outlined circle, and have though bubbles that all connect to a sketch of a young girl on a scooter and a boy playing with a dog.
Clarissa Sligh , Untitled (from Re-Framing the Past Series)
Landscape painting with green lawn next to a highway with five small houses behind a miniature golf course.
Randall Deihl, Untitled (The Hundred-Mile View)
Panting of a white background with shadows of leaves and a cayote with a horizontal black and white tulip above.
Duane Slick, Verifying the Invisible (Coyote and Tulips)
Photograph of a wall installation made of black old fabric taken from various clothes. They are laid out roughly in a diamond shape.
Merill Comeau, Women’s Work is Never Done