The Figge Art Museum is devoting gallery space for the next several years to what is arguably one of the greatest names in architectural history.

"Frank Lloyd Wright: The Art of Living," which opens for a preview today in the downtown Davenport museum, delves into the smaller picture of his work.

"People tend to think of Wright primarily as an architect, which is correct," senior curator Gregory Gilbert said. "The fact that he did a lot of decorative furnishing is now well-known. It highlights an aspect of his career that people are not as familiar with."

Eight pieces of Wright's home design items, ranging from the 1900s to the 1950s, are part of the display in the new second-floor gallery.

"This forces people to look at him in a different way," Figge executive director Sean O'Harrow said. "If you were to say, ‘Frank Lloyd Wright, interior designer,' they wouldn't think about it. Showing this exhibition would get them to focus on that."

The pieces are on an indefinite loan from a collector described by O'Harrow as the Figge's "No. 1 patron," a "local name who is also international and national."

The patron has at least a dozen more pieces that could rotate into the gallery.

"It'll evolve, rather than disappear and something takes its place," O'Harrow said.

Keeping pieces on a rotating basis and having three-dimensional work is part of changing the reputation of the Figge and its predecessor, the Davenport Museum of Art, O'Harrow said.

"It was very much a picture gallery, and for a lot of people, art is more than pictures. There's decorative art, textiles, glass," he said. "This is something that's more interesting for people."

It also helps further extend the Figge's plans for its Midwest Center for Art and Design, which will include the works already on loan from the University of Iowa Art Museum and a re-curated display of the Figge's landscape collection, he said.

"Midwest art has been instrumental in a number of art movements, but design has been preeminent," he said. "Part of that is that we had to build our society here.

"It's important that we have that in this museum."

O'Harrow said the works should bring more people and more out-of-town visitors to the Figge.

"Frank Lloyd Wright is an important name, and you have to have that sort of collection in a museum," he said.

"Tourists won't come to us without it," he continued. "They'll come here because there's an important name, important art. They'll travel for that."

 

ON DISPLAY

The new Frank Lloyd Wright: The Art of Living gallery, including this desk he designed, will open for a preview today, in advance of its official opening next week. Museum hours are 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. Tuesdays through Saturdays (until 9 p.m. Thursdays) and noon to 5 p.m. Sundays. Admission is $7 for adults, $6 for senior citizens (60 years and older) and $4 for youth 3-12 years. More information is available online at FiggeArtMuseum.com.

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• Frank Lloyd Wright object labels