Virginia Museum of Fine Arts Announces Gift of Nearly 2000 Photographs

The Viginia Museum of Fine Arts has announced a donation of nearly 2000 photographs from the Joy of Giving Something Inc., a nonprofit dedicated to the photographic arts. The gift comprises works spanning the 19th century and the present day by more than 450 artists.

The gift comes from the holdings of financier and former Dreyfus Corporation chief Howard Stein (1926–2011), who began collecting photography in the 1980s. A notable underwriter of photography exhibitions and books, Stein started the Joy of Giving Something Foundation (JGS) with his wife Janet in 1998 to advance art and educational programming in the field.

In 2017, JGS began donating works from Steins’s collection to selected museums and universities, among them Syracuse University, the Studio Museum in Harlem, and the Museum of the City of New York. In 2023 it gave the VMFA group of photographic portfolios and series, including Paul Strand’s Photographs of Mexico (1940) and Larry Clark’s Tulsa (1980).

The present gift represents most of the foundation’s remaining collection. Among its highlights are prints by nineteenth-century photographers Eugène Atget and Nadar; modernist works by Alfred Stieglitz, Dora Maar, László Moholy-Nagy, and Man Ray; and documentary photography by Berenice Abbot, Walker Evans, Dorothea Lange, and Mary Ellen Mark. Contemporary pieces include works by Adam Fuss, David Goldblatt, Gilles Peress, Fazal Sheikh, and Rosalind Fox Solomon.

The donation also comes with a grant to support the cataloging and housing of the collection. As part of major expansion and renovation project, the VMFA is planning five new photography galleries, which are scheduled to open in 2027.

“Through its breadth and depth, this gift significantly elevates the museum’s standing as a center for the study and presentation of photography,” said Dr. Sarah Kennel, VMFA’s Aaron Siskind Curator of Photography and Director of the Raysor Center for Works on Paper. “It opens new directions for future collecting—particularly through greatly expanded holdings of 19th- and early 20th-century photography—and will serve as a cornerstone for exhibitions and rotations in the new photography galleries, offering visitors a richer and more inclusive view of the medium’s history across multiple voices and practices.”

Below, 13 iconic works from JGS’s gift to the museum.