
The 2015 National Arts Awards were presented last week in New York by Americans for the Arts, and Alice Walton was a winner, along with Sophia Loren, Lady Gaga and Herbie Hancock, among others.
Walton, the Wal-Mart heiress and founder of Crystal Bridges Museum of American Art in Bentonville, attended the event at Cipriani 42nd Street, a luxurious banquet and event venue.
(For the literature lovers among you: Cipriani is a hospitality company that traces its roots to Guiseppe Cipriani, who founded Harry’s Bar in Venice, frequented by Ernest Hemingway. We’ll now return to our regular programming.)
Walton received the Arts Education Award.
The New York Observer snagged a rare interview with Walton, which included some interesting insights along with the condescension apparently obligatory from some in the East Coast press. For example (the italics are ours, for emphasis):
“’Art shouldn’t just be for people in big cities,’ she slowly and seriously enunciated with her sturdy, southern drawl. ‘What I care about is access to the arts for all people for all economic and ethnic backgrounds.’”
“That’s not to say that Ms. Walton scorns big cities. She was clearly enjoying her Manhattan evening with close friends and big-city arts players. Yet she seemed comfortable being the out-of-towner, and even her outfit exemplified a fusion of country and city: a dynamic red and black jacket with a pair of matching full-rimmed glasses, a kind of forward-thinking fashion mixed with ranch-hand practicality.”
Beyond the condescension, however, the article — headlined “How One of America’s Top Art Collectors, Alice Walton, Plans to Change the Art World” — noted that Walton wants to share art with the world, quoting her as saying, “I don’t want to see things in storage.”
“’Beyond what we show in the Ozarks there’s a real need for traveling exhibitions that go to regional museums,’ she said. ‘We’ve only begun to partner and share our works and exhibitions after three and three-quarter years.’”
In a way, the article summed up the Arkansas paradox: A bunch of people with sturdy, Southern drawls and ranch-hand practicality going around changing the world.