The 2025 session of the Utah Legislature opened last week. While every legislative session holds significance for Utah’s art community (see Utah Cultural Alliance’s priorities for the current session here), none may have been as important as the session held 126 years ago, the state’s third, which created the Utah Art Institute. An exhibition at Utah Valley University that opened in December celebrates the 125 anniversary of the creation of the Utah Art Institute (which became the Utah Arts Council, which in turn was subsumed into the Utah Division of Arts and Museums). It was the first state-sponsored arts organization in the country and its collection is named for the politician who helped create it, Alice Merrill Horne. In 2008 and 2009, we ran a three-part series of articles describing the formation of the Institute and the struggles it encountered in its first decade. Below is a reader’s digest version of that history. You can read the full history here, here and here.

Painting of roses by Alice Merrill Horne

Alice Merrill Horne loved flowers, and she knew how to use them: as decor, as subjects for her paintings, and as tools for political persuasion.

Though Horne is best known for her work as an advocate for Utah art, she was also a talented artist, recognized at the turn of the last century as one of the leading floral painters in the state. After completing a degree in pedagogy at the University of Utah, Horne took an interest in art and studied with J.T. Harwood and others. Her association with Harwood and her brief teaching career led Horne into a short-lived but highly productive political career.

In 1898, Harwood and fellow artist Edwin Evans successfully campaigned against the Augsburg system of art instruction, which was in use in Utah’s schools, leading to Harwood’s appointment as a high school art instructor. Encouraged by this victory, Horne pursued a seat in the Utah Legislature, with a key part of her platform advocating for a state-supported fine arts organization. Winning election in 1898, she introduced a bill in the 1899 legislative session creating the Utah Art Institute, the nation’s first state-funded arts organization. As her colleagues arrived to vote on the bill, she famously pinned flowers to their lapels—a strategic gesture that may have helped ensure its passage.

The Institute received an annual appropriation of $1,000 and was tasked with holding annual exhibitions, educating the public, and curating a state art collection. The legislation was strongly supported by Utah’s first governor, Heber M. Wells, who was from the opposing political party but was also the brother of Edna Wells Sloan—Horne’s friend and a noted floral painter—and the brother-in-law of artist H.L.A. Culmer. Wells appointed a governing board that included prominent Utah artists, educators, and even a representative of silk fabric arts. They met regularly and, by December 1899, hosted Utah’s first major public art exhibition.

Held in a repurposed space on Salt Lake City’s First South, the exhibit showcased more than 300 works, including paintings, sculptures, and decorative arts, drawing significant public interest. The majority were paintings — oils and watercolors — but there were also sculptural works, painted china, and a much-remarked-upon carved saddle. The vast majority were by locals, but the exhibition committee had worked hard to bring in substantial works from the East, importing works by sixteen artists from Chicago. These were greatly admired by those in attendance, but the local critics felt that the Utah works, especially the landscapes of Culmer, Harwood and Hafen, could more than hold their own. For her part, Horne exhibited two floral pieces, a fleur de lis and a composition of violets. By law, the award committee could only consider works by Utah artists. James T. Harwood’s “Salt Crested Rocks at Black Rock” won the $300 purchase award and became the first piece in the state art collection. A harvest scene by Edwin Evans and a landscape of Provo Canyon by John Hafen won the second and third place awards.

J.T. Harwood, “Salt Crested Rocks at Black Rock,” 1898, oil, 26×58 in.

Harwood’s work was joined in the state collection by two donated works. In exchange for lifetime membership in the Institute, George Ottinger donated his “Children of the Sun,” a work based on a Peruvian legend, and Emma C. Carson donated her “A Road Through the Forest.” The following year Harwood donated “Priscilla” and also became a lifetime member. Members of the community were also encouraged to become members of the Institute, and their annual or lifetime membership fees helped replenish the organization’s funds.

In September, the Institute began circulating ideas for the next exhibition. Since the organization’s bylaws forbade them from holding the annual exhibit in the same place two years in a row, various cities, including Ogden, Provo, Logan and Manti, began vying for the opportunity to host the Art Institute. Logan, which had three colleges, was eventually selected and the board announced that they would hold the exhibit for one week in the gymnasium of the Brigham Young College. Outside organizations, like the Daughters of the Revolution, excited by the success of the first exhibit, offered prizes of their own for this second exhibition.

When it came time to award the state purchase award, the awards committee ran into a problem. They were divided between John Hafen’s “Quaking Aspens” and Mary Teasdel’s “Peasant Woman Knitting.” Hoping to solve the dilemma by splitting the award and purchasing both pieces, they consulted the Attorney General, who felt that according to the bylaws such an action would be deemed illegal. The committee reluctantly settled on Hafen’s work, but couldn’t let the Teasdel go. Horne, who was becoming a consummate advocate for Utah artists, stepped in. She began soliciting new memberships (and one can’t help but imagine her going door to door, bouquet of posies in hand), and when she raised a total of $250, the Teasdel became part of the state collection, and both artists went home with more money than they would have if the award had been split.

George H. Taggart, “Prayer,” 1901, 22×38 in.

Despite early successes, factionalism soon arose. Utah’s art community was divided between those trained in the American tradition, such as H.L.A. Culmer and George Ottinger, and those influenced by European trends, notably the Paris-trained Evans, John Fairbanks, and Mary Teasdel. In 1902, tensions flared when Paul Menzel’s hyper-detailed miniature portraits were suspected of being retouched photographs. Though ultimately deemed authentic, the controversy highlighted growing rivalries, with the American school championing a realistic approach to drawing and painting and the European school favoring a more interpretive approach.

Another dispute emerged over public school art instruction. The Art Institute was asked to weigh in on adopting a new drawing textbook. Horne, herself a schoolteacher, had long campaigned against the idea of copying models from textbooks and championed the development of direct teaching of natural talents (a process, that would require the schools to employ the state’s artists as instructors). Culmer, however, supported a textbook-oriented approach known as the Prang system. The disagreement became personal, with letters in the press revealing underlying tensions. Shortly after, Culmer was voted out as Institute president, replaced by Teasdel, signaling a shift in power towards the Paris-trained artists.

Mary H. Teasdel, “Mother and Child,” 1902, 31×25 in.

That fall, the annual exhibition was held at the Brigham Young Academy in Provo. It appears that Culmer, who usually exhibited several works in the annual exhibition, did not exhibit. Mary Teasdel, on the other hand, swept the purchase prizes, her “Mother and Child” winning the $300 prize for oil paintings and the $50 prize for watercolor going to her “Fairy Tales.” As had happened in 1900, the collection was supplemented by an additional purchase when the lifetime memberships of Mr. and Mrs. David Keith allowed the Institute to purchase Taggart’s “The Harvesters.” John Hafen’s “Forest Solitude,” depicting a small clearing in an evergreen forest, won the Medal of Honor.

The most dramatic conflict came in 1903, when the annual purchase award was withheld for the first time. The awards committee, chaired by Ottinger, refused to award purchase prizes, claiming alternately that there were irregularities in the process of submissions, and that none of the works submitted merited being purchased by the state. Edwin Evans and John Fairbanks, the only two artists who had works in contention, objected and demanded the committee give the awards to one or the other. The controversy escalated into a lawsuit, exposing deep divisions within the Institute.

While the lawsuit was making its way through the courts, a second exhibition was hurriedly arranged at the Commercial Club. The Paris-trained faction of artists did not submit works. The judges for the second exhibition—none of whom were fine artists—selected Culmer’s “Grand Canyon of the Colorado in Arizona” for the purchase prize. Evans and Fairbanks’ case, meanwhile, made its way through the courts until a decision dismissing the suit was made at the end of January, 1904. The American faction seemed to have won the day and now controlled the Institute’s governing board. In the end, however, the controversy forced the state to return Culmer’s painting (which was subsequently exhibited at the St. Louis World’s Fair of 1904 hen found a home in the prestigious collection of Col. Edwin Holmes of Salt Lake City).

H.L.A. Culmer’s “Grand Canyon of the Colorado in Arizona,” (1903, watercolor, 30×40 in.) is currently available at Anthony’s Antiques in Salt Lake City.

Political shifts in 1905 further changed the Institute’s leadership. New governor John C. Cutler appointed a board favoring the Paris-trained school, including J. Leo Fairbanks, Alma B. Wright, and John Hafen. Over the next decade, artists who had studied in France dominated Utah’s major exhibitions, while Culmer and Ottinger, previously central figures, faded from prominence.

The internal struggles of the Utah Art Institute had played out in the public eye, and as a result the organization faced serious legislative threats over the next few years. The first came in 1905, when some members of the legislature, with the support of the Salt Lake Herald, claimed that the taxpayers were not receiving a fair value for their investment and that the Institute was plagued by conflicts of interest. One bill proposed the abolition of the organization, while a compromise bill suggested folding the Alice Art Collection into a state art collection to be housed at the University of Utah. Both bills were squashed by the Senate education committee, however, and neither came to a vote. A legislative threat in 1907 was more serious. That year, the legislature met in the midst of a recession and a stock market slide that would result in the panic of 1907 that fall. In these unsteady economic times, a bill was once again introduced to completely abolish the organization. Public support from educational institutions, business leaders, and even the LDS Church helped protect the institution.

After passing through these legislative rapids, the Utah Art Institute faced relatively calm waters for the rest of the decade; and their example spurred the launching of numerous other enterprises to support the arts. The Institute’s exhibitions expanded, introducing new categories such as decorative arts and architecture. By 1909, procedural reforms reduced internal conflicts. Purchase awards were now determined by a statewide vote of Institute members, rather than a small jury. That year, when two artists tied for third place in the watercolor category, Governor William Spry resolved the matter simply—by having them draw straws from a broom.

Through internal rivalries and legislative threats, the Utah Art Institute proved resilient. It fostered cultural growth in the state and set a national precedent for public support of the arts. By the Great Depression, it expanded beyond visual arts to include literature and performance, eventually becoming the Utah Arts Council—an enduring testament to Alice Merrill Horne’s vision.

125th Anniversary Exhibition: Utah Divsion of Arts and Museums, Utah Valley University Museum of Art, Orem, through March 15 

Shawn Rossiter

The founder of Artists of Utah and editor of its online magazine, 15 Bytes, Shawn Rossiter has undergraduate degrees in English, French and Italian Literature and studied Comparative Literature in graduate school before pursuing a career in art.