The Ponca City Library’s brick and terra cotta exterior houses the Matzene Art Collection, a unique and extensive collection of artwork consisting of both Oriental and Western art. These paintings and statues are on display year-round throughout the building. Richard Gordon Matzene, a well-known photographer, art dealer, and world traveler donated a substantial part of his collection of American Western art and Oriental art to the Library in the 1950s.
For more information about the Matzene Art Collection, please contact the Library at (580) 767-0345 or request an art tour.
Richard Gordon Matzene & His Collection
The collection includes oils, charcoals, and water colors, as well as three-dimensional bronze and pottery pieces. Matzene maintained studios in New York City, Chicago, Los Angeles, and India. He also had a close relationship with Birger Sandzen of the Prairie Print Makers and with Nicholai Fechin, a Russian born painter. Both of these artists have artwork in the Library’s collection as well.
On one of Matzene’s many trips to the Orient, he was forced to hide in the basement of a Chinese friend during the Boxer Rebellion. During this trip to China, he acquired several pieces of art from the Imperial Palace. Then in 1927, he was invited to photograph the Royal Nepalese family. These very rare art pieces and photographs are all a part of the Matzene Art Collection.
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