Teacher Gifts $1.7M to Detroit Institute of Arts

The Detroit Institute of Arts received a gift of $1.71 million from Elizabeth Verdow, a former museum shop volunteer and Detroit Public Schools art teacher.
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The Detroit Institute of Arts received a gift of $1.71 million from Elizabeth Verdow, a former museum shop volunteer and Detroit Public Schools art teacher.

Verdow, who passed away in 2014 at the age of 86, stipulated that $1.26 million of the gift be used for contemporary art acquisitions of painting and sculpture and $450,000 go towards the museum’s operating endowment.

Before her death, Verdow, a graduate from Albion College, taught art for the Detroit Public Schools system during her career. She volunteered at the Detroit Institute of Arts from 1990 to 2009 and was known for her dedication, love of the arts, and her fondness to travel, says Salvador Salort-Pons, director of Detroit Institute of Arts.

The Detroit Institute will honor Verdow by including her name on the Robert S. Tannahil Society donor wall at the museum and by naming her fund the Elizabeth Verdow Contemporary Art Acquisition Fund. Art purchased with this fund will be identified with gallery labels bearing her name.