Selections from the Permanent Collection

Open through February 2

See a seasonal selection of artworks by local artists from our permanent collection. Many of the works featured come from the Philipp Brockington Collection and orbit the community of prominent artists involved at Valparaiso’s Art Barn School of Art.

Featured Artworks

New Wave VIII, 1999, by Virginia Phillips. Oil on canvas. From the Brockington Collection, 2023.40.2

Virginia Phillips (1931-2017) was born in Chicago and earned a degree in interior design at the Art Institute of Chicago before joining Marc T. Nielsen as a designer in 1953. She followed the interior design firm to Valparaiso in 1960, where she lived and worked for the rest of her life. While in Valparaiso, she took a workshop with Harriet Rex Smith at the Art Barn; the experience ignited a love of painting that was later sustained by the encouragement of German expressionist Konrad Juestel. A note by Phillips on the back of this painting succinctly describes her artistic vision: “A winter scene from a borrowed photo. This meets all the criteria I set for myself—abstract, color bigger than life, strong brush strokes showing lots of energy.”

Magic of Autumn, 1936, by Frank V. Dudley. Oil on canvas. From the Brockington Collection, 2023.40.3

Frank Virgil Dudley loved the Indiana Dunes. Described by art historian William Gerdts as “one of the finest painters working in the Midwest in the first decades of the twentieth century,” Dudley dedicated much of his professional painting life to the movement to preserve the Indiana Dunes as protected parkland. Thanks in large part to the efforts of passionate conservationists like Dudley, Indiana Dunes State Park was established in 1926, and a National Lakeshore was created in 1966, later upgraded to National Park status in 2019. This shining example is one of two Dudley paintings in the PoCo Muse Collection. It captures the essence of the Dunes in the fall and attests to Dudley’s artistic legacy.

About the Robert Cain Gallery

The Robert Cain Gallery honors M. Robert “Rob” Cain (1930-2022), a lifelong Valparaiso resident and beloved Valparaiso High School art teacher. In 2014, Cain participated in the dedication of the Robert Cain Gallery in our former location at 153 Franklin Street in Valparaiso. The naming was made possible by a special gift from Joanne & Dan Urschel, whose family members were inspired by Cain from their time in his classroom.