E l P a l a c i o 4948 E l P a l a c i o

Alexander Girard was not your typical collector, selecting a kente cloth here and

a clay figure there. He bought in quantity—large quantities. Where another folk-art collector might

purchase one item, Girard, while on buying trips with his wife, Susan, would scoop up fifty or more of

the same thing. Even on their honeymoon in Mexico they filled the car with folk art.

No surprise. Alexander Girard’s fascination with collecting began as a boy, when he was given a Nativity

scene. It was the first of oh so many. Over the years he added to the collection in both number and

elaboration. Friends and relatives returning from travels to other countries would bring the young Girard

miniatures, and soon a collector was born.

A native of New York who was raised in Florence, Italy, Girard developed an eye for design early and

pursued an education in architecture, studying in Rome at the Royal School of Architecture and at the

Royal Institute of British Architects in London. In 1936 he moved back to New York and then to Detroit,

where he broadened the scope of his practice, designing the interiors of offices (the Ford Motor Company

headquarters among them), stores, and homes. Along the way he developed a reputation for designing

By Steve Cantrell

CollectionTheGirard It is entirely possible to be both delighted and overwhelmed by the Alexander

Girard’s one-of-a-kind exhibition—even after twenty-five years. The vastness of

the exhibit space, the complexity of the design, the sheer quantity of objects on

display—the immensity and intensity can be overpowering. And compelling.

That’s why Multiple Visions: A Common Bond has been the destination for well

over a million first-time and repeat visitors to the Museum of International Folk Art.

First, second, third, or countless times around, we find our gaze drawn by different

objects, different scenes. Even after more than a decade here at the museum, I

always “discover” a new piece, one that I’ve passed by but not focused on before.

I expect that the more than 10,000 objects to see will continue to enchant

museum staff and patrons. With his singular vision and intuitive understanding of

the multiplicity of cultures and artistic genres, perhaps Girard himself felt the same

unflagging delight when he was designing the exhibit.

Girard rewards those who look carefully with touches of wit and whimsy,

amazing us with his command of detail and sense of perspective. He appeals to

children and adults alike who peer into the sets from different angles, to glimpse

people and animals, puppets, dolls, and small figures of clay, wood, paper, cloth,

and, yes, even plastics. Some look familiar, clearly identifiable as the products of

specific cultures and places. Others take us to places we can only imagine.

Who can ever tire of going back to these places of enjoyment and creativity?

—Joyce Ice, Director

Museum of International Folk Art

“

”

“ Christening,” the

Aguilar family,

Ocotlán de Morelos,

Oaxaca. Mexico.

Museum of

International Folk Art

(DCA), Santa Fe,

New Mexico. Photo

by Blair Clark.

50 E l P a l a c i o50 E l P a l a c i o E l P a l a c i o 51

and well being. Amulets also safeguard the wearer

during critical periods of life passage and

transformation …

In acquiring his collection of ex-votos and

amulets, Girard privileged the visual and the

intuitive. It was his immediate encounter with the

visual aesthetic and decorative appeal of the object,

not its background or the ethnographic purity, that

motivated him. Girard did not intellectualize this

pursuit, and so he left no “word trail,” no

documentations about the individual objects or his

collection habits. It seems safe to assume, however,

that on early folk-art collecting trips to Mexico,

Girard was struck by the similarities between the

miniature representations of body parts for sale

outside cathedrals and those he knew from growing

up in Florence, Italy. Their decorative appeal and

likenesses in shape, religious significance, form,

and function, despite differences in cultural context,

might have served as Girard’s criteria for selecting

ex-votos to purchase.

Girard seems to have understood intuitively that

such objects encapsulated ritual practices related to

the sacred—to what he termed “the magic and

mysteries of life”… ■

Excerpted from Faith and Transformation: Votive

Offerings and Amulets from the Alexander Girard

Collection, edited by Doris Francis, with

photographs by Paul Smutko, and published by

the Museum of New Mexico Press on the

centennial of Alexander H. Girard’s birth and the

twenty-fifth anniversary of the opening of the

Girard Wing of the Museum of International Folk

Art, in Santa Fe. This book and others are available

from the Museum of New Mexico Press by

telephone order, (800) 249-7737, and at Museum

of New Mexico Shops in Santa Fe and select

bookstores everywhere.

Doris Francis, Ph.D., a research associate at the

Museum of International Folk Art, is an

anthropologist and social gerontologist. Her

publications include Will You Still Need Me, Will

You Still Feed Me, When I’m 84? (1984) and The

Secret Cemetery (2005).

This case in Multiple Visions: A Common Bond holds a range of objects from different parts of Morocco

and other North and Sub-Saharan African countries. All of the amulets are intended to hold pieces of paper

written in Qur’anic verses or other magic formulas.

everything for his projects—carpet, drapery, furniture, even

the placement of objects in a room—a “control issue” that

would become a Girard hallmark, and one that would make

Multiple Visions the exhibition that it is today.

Girard became head of the textile design division for Herman

Miller, in 1952, at a time when fabrics were purely functional

and devoid of decoration. That changed in the twenty years he

headed the division. As renowned designer Jack Lenor Larson

said in Folk Art from the Global Village: The Girard Collection

at the Museum of International Folk Art: “Girard’s career can be

summed up as a long, single-handed campaign to inject the

lively human qualities of joy and spontaneity into what was

probably one of the driest, sensually impoverished chapters in

the history of design.”

Girard felt that fabrics needed color, and Herman Miller

gave him the freedom to express himself. Girard did that by

bringing his passion for ethnic motifs and extravagantly

bright colors to the clean, streamlined aesthetic that

dominated mid-century design. It was not long before

American interiors, both commercial and residential, were

influenced by his bold designs.

His love of theatricality—drama, color and large-scale—

came from his post college days in Europe designing stage sets

and showrooms. This talent was realized to its fullest in New

York City in 1961 with the Herman Miller Textiles & Objects

store in midtown Manhattan. Patrons were amazed at the

juxtaposition of his bold fabrics, the modernist Herman Miller

furniture, and the inclusion of folk art—all of it for sale. It was

the first time New Yorkers had really been introduced to folk

art in a store that was so precisely designed that it was a work

of art in itself.

When Braniff Airlines commissioned him to create a new look

for the company, Girard took design to new heights, replacing

even the “plain plane.” He painted them inside and out with

W henever I visited a close friend in Santa Fe in

the mid-1980s, we always went to the

Museum of International Folk Art. I was particularly

attracted to its collection of objects assembled by

Alexander Girard that related to the human body—

small, shiny metal representations of the body and

its many different parts; amulets worn close to the

person; packets of powders to be sprinkled over

the body; and tablets to be ingested into the body.

My friend and I would go from case to case,

fascinated by the resonance of images of eyes and

hands and by the similarities and dissimilarities

among pieces from many cultures. Although these

artifacts came from societies different from our

own, all of them were accessible and immediately

recognizable, intimate and familiar. They were

about our shared human bodies, and we perceived

them as our embodied selves.

Still, I wondered, what made the objects so

affecting, so compelling? We sensed that these

were not ordinary objects but were endowed with

the qualities that transcended the everyday. Yet the

labels for the display cases gave only the objects’

geographical place of origin or the place where

Girard had collected them. Ironically, ours was

exactly the response Alexander Girard, the

internationally famous designer and folk art

collector, hoped to evoke in museum visitors. “I’ve

watched people in museums,” he said. “Most of

them walk glazedly by, not really seeing what’s

there. They already know all about the things, only

they don’t know anything because they haven’t

been given a chance to see them… [The goal is] to

shock as much as possible, not to be boring, and to

make everyone want to come back.”

In presenting his exhibition of ex-votos and

amulets, Girard wished to create “a purely visual

experience… allowing viewers to reach their own

personal and unconditioned conclusions.” Although

his display encouraged visitors to grasp the

“similarity of the objects from dissimilar places,” it

offered no explanatory labels, no “crutches on

which to hang assumptions.” The human body was

the shared visual experience, the “common

denominator” of communication. That common

denominator enabled museum visitors, despite

their varied backgrounds and subjective

experiences, to respond to the pieces without

simply dismissing them as “strange.”

The ex-votos, or votive offerings (milagros, in

Spanish; tamata, in Greek), in the Girard collection

are small metal objects, often in the shapes of

human figures or specific parts of the body, such

as legs, arms, hands, hearts, and feet. These votive

effigies are presented as gifts to supernatural

beings in thankful reciprocation for favors received,

or they might accompany propitiatory prayers for

consolation and assistance …

Amulets, also part of the Girard collection, are

similarly used in interaction with the supernatural

yet are seen to function in different ways. Believed

to carry supernormal potency and efficacy and to

have lifelike powers, they are worn to drive away

evil and provide spiritual and physical protection

against danger and illness. On the positive side,

people wear them to promote life—affirming

blessings such as fertility, success in business,

physical strength, and general good fortune, health,

In the Eye of the BeholderBY DORIS FRANCIS

“ Italian Villa with Boats,” Museum of

International Folk Art (DCA), Santa Fe,

New Mexico. Photo by Blair Clark.

52 E l P a l a c i o

ON EXHIBIT

E l P a l a c i o 53

different hues and then used variations on a multicolored

rainbow for flight attendants’ uniforms, the company stationery,

the matchbooks, and even the sugar packets.

Though Girard was a social animal during his days with

Herman Miller and working with designers George Nelson,

Charles Eames and Ray Eames, he and his wife wanted a

quieter life and more sun than they enjoyed in either New York

or Grosse Pointe, Michigan. In 1953, the couple moved their

family to Santa Fe, and with them came the folk art collections

that had never stopped growing. Girard’s numerous trips

abroad for clients had allowed him the opportunity to continue

collecting, sometimes for them, always for himself. Once in

Santa Fe, the ever-growing collection was boxed, catalogued,

and stored in two old houses.

Girard’s son, Marshall, who lives in Santa Fe, recalled how his

father collected everywhere he went, sometimes on his own,

sometimes with family in tow. He noted that

finely made furniture and antiques have been

passions for Girard patriarchs through the

ages: his paternal great-grandfather, a furniture

maker in Europe, had an antique store, as did

his paternal grandfather. Another Girard

tradition: sons worked for fathers, including

Alexander for his father. Perhaps it was from

that generational progression and love of fine

craftsmanship that Girard’s appreciation for

the handmade came about. He had a

woodworking shop at his home and made the

storage boxes for his collection and

architectural models with his own hands.

At times Alexander Girard pressed family

members into service to help add to his

collection. One time Marshall met his father

in Rome and was asked to carry a large

collection of Ethiopian bark paintings to

New York. At Idlewild Airport in New York,

customs officials detained him, doubting that

an eighteen-year-old could be interested in

these objects and convinced that he had

stolen them. It took phone calls to his mother

and to the family lawyer to persuade the

officials that indeed these bark paintings

belonged to the Girard family and that young Marshall was

merely transporting them home for his father.

Had he only been carrying some of his personal favorites—

boats—perhaps the questions would have been fewer and the

hassle worth his while.

Marshall said that though other museums expressed great

interest in having Girard’s collection, his father loved New

Mexico and wanted the collection to stay in Santa Fe. Legend

has it that because of the Girard Collection at the Museum

of International Folk Art, the Smithsonian Institution invited

the museum to become part of its system.

The offer was declined but, with a touch

of hubris, was extended in return to the

Smithsonian. Whether or not the story

is accurate, the state legislature realized

the importance of the collection and

appropriated most of the money to construct the Girard

Wing—a bold move on its part. Folk art was not widely

understood or appreciated at that time, and most collecting

in Santa Fe was restricted to Indian artifacts.

Girard insisted on installing the collection himself, because

only he knew how each piece properly related to others. Not

only did he have the perfect eye for collecting high-quality

objects (he was known to say that there was good folk art and

there was folk art that lacked any aesthetic quality), by designing

the installation itself, he also made the entire wing “a singular

artifact, a Girard work of art,” said Joyce Ice, director of the

Museum of International Folk Art. As Girard put it in Folk Art

from the Global Village, “Part of my passion has always been to

see objects in context. As a collector who was often able to visit

the workshop of the artist and see the actual environment in

which a piece was made, I’ve often felt that objects lose half their

lives when they are taken out of their national settings…

I believe that if you put objects into a world which is ostensibly

their own, the whole thing begins to breathe.”

Finding a FavoriteLongtime docent Elisabeth Alley said that the installation is

proof of Girard’s genius and that visitors continue to prove

that. She has seen reluctant visitors wander in and then stay for

a surprising amount of time, dazzled by what she calls Girard’s

“jewel in the crown of the museum.” For her it is a jewel with

BELOW: “Metal-cutouts/Replicas of Early American Weather Vanes,”

by Ivan Barnett, United States, 1981. Museum of International Folk

Art (DCA), Santa Fe, New Mexico.

Photo by Blair Clark.

“ Plaza de Torres,” State of Jalisco, Mexico, ca.

1965. Museum of International Folk Art (DCA),

Santa Fe, New Mexico. Photo by Blair Clark.

“ Harbor Scene,” Museum of

International Folk Art (DCA), Santa Fe,

New Mexico. Photo by Blair Clark.

E l P a l a c i o 5554 E l P a l a c i o

many facets, because Alley has more than one favorite piece:

Heaven and Hell, the cockfighting scene, the christening, and

depictions of people dining.

Why dining scenes? For Girard, a meal was a ritual.

According to Jean Seth, who frequently socialized with the

Girards, the dining table he designed for their home was

suspended from the ceiling. This sense of ritual and theatricality

carried over to the table settings he once designed for Georg

Jensen in New York. Among the six table settings he designed

were the Hostess set and the Husband and Wife set.

Artist and designer Ivan Barnett recalled visiting the Museum

of International Folk Art in the early 1980s, long before he and

his wife, Allison, opened Patina Gallery in Santa Fe, only to

discover his own work on exhibit. At the time, Barnett was

constructing contemporary weather vanes in his studio in

Lancaster, Pennsylvania, and they were being sold at the

American Museum of Folk Art in New York—several of them

to Alexander Girard.

Girard’s reputation for collecting in mass quantities made

him a well-known figure to artists and artisans around the

world. Jean Seth, whose favorite piece is the Plaza de Toros,

recalled that when she visited Machu Picchu in Peru and told

the vendors she was from Santa Fe, they all wanted to know if

she was a friend of Girard’s.

Not only was Jean Seth a friend: her father, J.O. Seth,was a

Museum of New Mexico regent from the 1930s to the 1950s and

also the attorney who advised founder Florence Dibell Bartlett

on how to establish the folk art museum; her husband, Judge

Oliver Seth, set up the International Folk Art Foundation (IFAF);

and her daughter, Laurel, is executive direcor to IFAF on whose

board Alexander Girard once sat.

Laurel Seth grew up with folk art and knew Girard as a

frequent guest in her home. At fourteen, she volunteered to

work in the collection and knows it intimately, perhaps too

intimately to single out a favorite. So many collectors, she says,

confine themselves to one country or to certain items. She

noted Alexander Girard was the

exception, collecting from 100

countries and selecting on

aesthetics and quality. For Laurel,

the breadth of Multiple Visions: A

Common Bond sets it apart from

other folk-art collections. That,

and Girard’s skill at creating

vignettes, rather than lining up

like items next to wall text, made

folk art accessible.

Girard’s design resonates with

John and Marilyn Newhart, who

worked with Girard and the Eameses at Herman Miller. They

remembered that Girard ran a meticulous workshop there.

Everything had its place, and at night, everything went into

the drawers. Their mutual friendship with Girard grew, and

soon they went on what Girard called “junking trips,” daylong

forays to New York’s countless antique stores. Marilyn said

that Girard had such a good and swift eye that he would

immediately spot the best of the objects. He moved through

the store so quickly, taking items to the sales counter, that it

was nearly impossible to shop with him. He got all the best

things first.

Marilyn used the word “massive” to describe Girard’s method

of collecting: not only would he purchase in huge quantities, he

would place orders for several whole village scenes. And why

not? Girard himself said in Folk Art from the Global Village,

which was published after his death in 1993, that his collecting

philosophy was uncomplicated: “What concerns me is an

object’s intrinsic value. And, collecting for that reason is very

different from acquiring things as if they were currency....With

me, it was really pretty simple: love of the objects came first, and

there was absolutely no other criterion for collecting.” ■

Steve Cantrell is the public relations manager at Museum Resources Division, Department of Cultural Affairs.

“ Pueblo Feast Day,” the Vigil family,

Tesuque Pueblo, New Mexico, ca.

1960. Museum of International Folk

Art (DCA), Santa Fe, New Mexico.

Photo by Blair Clark.

This year the Museum of International Folk Art marks the Girard

Collection’s twenty-fifth anniversary and Alexander Girard’s

100th birthday with ¡Celebrate Girard! with events to rival those

when the Girard Wing opened in 1982. Since then more than a

million visitors have seen Multiple Visions: A Common Bond.

Anniversary Gala and Birthday Commemoration SATURDAY, NOVEMBER 10, 2007

Lavish food from Santa Fe’s finest chefs and complimentary

beverages in the Braniff lounge. Live music and dancing

in the La Fonda del Sol Ballroom. Auction of art by noted

Santa Fe and international artists, holiday gift baskets, Girard

collectibles. Sixties fashions, bouffant coiffures and leisure

suits encouraged but optional. Proceeds benefit the museum’s

Celebrate Girard! Project to improve the Multiple Visions

exhibition and storage for the Girard Collection. Tickets are

$150; (505) 982-6366, ext. 112.

Anniversary WeekendSATURDAY, DECEMBER 8, 2007, 7 P.M.–10 P.M.

Celebrate the twenty-fifth anniversary of the opening of Multiple

Visions: A Common Bond with live music and dancing, hands–

on art activities, artists in costume and stilt walkers. Costumes

encouraged but not required. Complimentary appetizers; cash

bar. Admission is free.

SUNDAY, DECEMBER 9, 2007, 1 P.M.– 4 P.M.

The twenty-fifth anniversary celebration continues with

myriad activities. Among them are a book signing for Faith

and Transformation: Votive Offerings and Amulets from the

Alexander Girard Collection, edited by Doris Francis; artists

in costume; stilt walkers; hands-on art activities for all ages;

complimentary refreshments; and music by Steve Chavez’s

New Mexican Marimba Band. By museum admission; New

Mexico residents with I.D. are free on Sundays; youth 16 and

under and foundation members are always free.

Additional special events are planned in 2008.

Alexander Girard, 1988, Girard Collection. Museum of International Folk

Art (DCA), Santa Fe, New Mexico. Photograph by Michel Monteaux.

¡Celebrate Girard!