WPI Oral History: Connie Glenn on Tom Wesselmann (Session 2)

Constance “Connie” W. Glenn is an acclaimed art historian, curator, writer, and collector. She is the founding director of the University Art Museum at California State University Long Beach, where she also established the Graduate Certificate Program in Museum Studies and taught courses in art history and museum studies. Since the 1960s, she has been an avid collector with a particular interest in Pop Art and the works of Tom Wesselmann. In her second oral history session with WPI, Glenn discusses her philosophy as a collector, her correspondence with Wesselmann on the difficulties of classifying works, and her observations of shifts in Wesselmann’s approach over the course of his career. KEYWORDS: Pop Art, Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, Great American Nudes, California State University Long Beach, Wayne Thiebaud, Jonathan Borofsky, Ivan Karp, Jack Glenn Gallery, Sidney Janis Gallery, Leo Castelli, art criticism, Frank Stella, Paul Bianchini, Sunset Nudes, Abstract Expressionism