This year, Lawrence Arts Center is thrilled to welcome more than 200 incredible artworks for our 2023 Benefit Art Auction! Without the generous donations of all participating artists, we couldn’t put together this unique collection of artistic creations. This year, we’re tremendously grateful for Rick Stein’s and Richard Frishman’s donations, which we’ve highlighted below.
Walnut Cabinet
Rick Stein
Live Auction Item #18
Rick Stein’s furniture designs are influenced by many generations of furniture builders—the Shakers, makers in the Arts and Crafts tradition, and architect brothers Charles and Henry Greene, whose designs show a strong Japanese influence. Stein has been particularly inspired by recent makers James Krenov, George Nakashima, John Fox and local furniture maker and friend Will Orvedal.
Rick’s donated piece to the 2023 Art Auction, titled Walnut Cabinet, is a beautifully crafted cabinet made from walnut and maple with a delicate touch of shoji paper. Rick also included a delightful surprise inside the cabinet — an inlaid turquoise stone where a knot once was.
Bid on Walnut Cabinet during the live auction at the Lawrence Arts Center on April 8 at 7:30 pm. Purchase tickets to the event at one.bidpal.net/artauction2023.
Colored Window at Edd’s Drive-In; Pascagoula, Mississippi, 2019
Richard Frishman
Silent Auction Item #87
Richard Frishman’s photographs explore how the built environment reveals our cultural histories. In 2021 Frishman was awarded a Guggenheim Fellowship for photography. The book of his current documentary project, Ghosts of Segregation, is being published by Celadon/Macmillan in February 2024. The Ghosts traveling exhibition premiered at the Lawrence Arts Center in 2021.
Edd’s Drive-In opened in 1954, during the era of Jim Crow. Until the late 1960s, people of color had to order at the segregated window on the far right, and they could only place their order when no white customers were waiting. The owners retained it as a reminder of the suffering so many have endured. “If we forget where we’ve been,” she said, “we can get lost again.”
Bid on Colored Window at Edd’s Drive-In online in the silent auction until April 8 at 7:15 pm. View all auction items and bid in the silent auction at one.bidpal.net/artauction2023.
All proceeds from the Benefit Art Auction fund the Lawrence Arts Center’s Exhibitions Program, helping keep the galleries free and open to the public year-round. Online bidding in the silent auction is open until April 8 at 7:15 pm, followed by the live auction at 7:30 pm. Learn more, bid in the silent auction and purchase tickets for the live auction event at one.bidpal.net/artauction2023.
