Lyndel King jokingly calls herself the "grandmother" of the Twin Cities art scene.
No joke: After 40 years as director of the University of Minnesota's Weisman Art Museum, King announced Tuesday she's stepping down — but not until June 2020, so she can raise funds to ensure her successor has "a little extra money, which I never had, to start off."
King was a true pioneer. There were few women leading museums when she became the Weisman's director in 1981, three years after joining its staff.
More crucially, the Weisman simply didn't exist before King. For nearly 60 years the museum's collection was housed in rooms on the fourth floor of the university's Northrop auditorium.
King gave renowned architect Frank Gehry his first major commission, and she raised $18 million to build the striking stainless-steel-and-brick home on the University of Minnesota's East Bank campus that became an immediate Twin Cities landmark when it opened in 1993.
"From the very beginning, Lyndel promoted the need for a world-class university to have a world-class art museum on its campus," Gehry said in a statement Tuesday. "She understood that the arts were a critical part of students' education, and she dedicated herself to making this dream into a reality.
"I can tell you that the Weisman Art Museum exists because of her indomitable spirit, her intelligence, and her perseverance."
Named for Minneapolis-born, Los Angeles-based collector Frederick Weisman — who donated $3.3 million for construction, plus $1 million worth of art — the museum put Gehry on the map, leading to bigger projects such as the Bilbao Guggenheim Museum in Spain. (The Weisman is sometimes called "Baby Bilbao.")
