S. Lane Faison Jr.: 98, Dies; Art Historian and Professor
S. Lane Faison Jr., an art historian who cut his teeth cataloging Hitler’s collection of plundered paintings, then, as a Williams College professor, inspired students who went on to head many of America’s leading art institutions, died on Saturday at his home in Williamstown, Mass. He was 98.
Morton Owen Schapiro, the president of Williams, who announced the death, said his “legacy will forever be spread far and wide through the countless students he turned on to art.”
Mr. Faison’s achievement was taking young men at what was then an all-male school and diverting them from careers as doctors and bank executives by turning them into art history majors. A typical disciple was Glenn D. Lowry, a pre-med student in the early 1970’s whose main interest was skiing but who tagged along on an impromptu tour Mr. Faison happened to give of Williams’s highly respected art museum.
“Off we galloped,” Mr. Lowry said. “We spent hours there, and I was transformed.”
Mr. Lowry is now director of the Museum of Modern Art in New York. Others who studied with Mr. Faison and his renowned colleagues Whitney S. Stoddard and William H. Pierson include Earl A. Powell III, director of the National Gallery of Art, Thomas Krens, director of the Guggenheim Foundation, and Kirk T. Varnedoe, chief curator of painting and sculpture at the Modern until his death in 2003.
Still others include Michael Govan, director of the Los Angeles County Museum of Art; James Wood, former director of the Art Institute of Chicago; John R. Lane, director of the Dallas Museum of Art; and E. Roger Mandle, president of the Rhode Island School of Design.
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Morton Owen Schapiro, the president of Williams, who announced the death, said his “legacy will forever be spread far and wide through the countless students he turned on to art.”
Mr. Faison’s achievement was taking young men at what was then an all-male school and diverting them from careers as doctors and bank executives by turning them into art history majors. A typical disciple was Glenn D. Lowry, a pre-med student in the early 1970’s whose main interest was skiing but who tagged along on an impromptu tour Mr. Faison happened to give of Williams’s highly respected art museum.
“Off we galloped,” Mr. Lowry said. “We spent hours there, and I was transformed.”
Mr. Lowry is now director of the Museum of Modern Art in New York. Others who studied with Mr. Faison and his renowned colleagues Whitney S. Stoddard and William H. Pierson include Earl A. Powell III, director of the National Gallery of Art, Thomas Krens, director of the Guggenheim Foundation, and Kirk T. Varnedoe, chief curator of painting and sculpture at the Modern until his death in 2003.
Still others include Michael Govan, director of the Los Angeles County Museum of Art; James Wood, former director of the Art Institute of Chicago; John R. Lane, director of the Dallas Museum of Art; and E. Roger Mandle, president of the Rhode Island School of Design.