Collections : [Virginia Museum of Fine Arts]

The collection documents the activities of the Aaron Siskind Foundation during its years of operation, from 1984 to 2020. Aaron Siskind directed that his estate become a resource that would support contemporary photography and reward and encourage excellence in its practitioners. Since his death in 1991, the Aaron Siskind Foundation provided cash grants to individual photographic artists on a yearly basis until disbanding in 2020.

The collection is comprised of over 100 mounted exhibition prints by members of the Camera Club of Richmond. Almost all of the prints were taken by Philip M. Luce, however there are several prints by William Edwin Booth (co-founder of the Club in 1932) and Vallie L. Booth.

The collection documents the rich history of the Council of the Virginia Museum of Fine Arts, the museum's oldest and longest-running support group. Founded in 1955 by a group of interested women, the Council has grown greatly over the years in membership, events, projects and support given to the museum. The collection spans the entire six decade history of the Council through minutes, officer's reports, committee reports, subject/event files, and some past Presidents' files. A large portion of the documentation is devoted to the Council Sales Shop, begun in 1962, and turned over to the museum in 2010.

The collections documents the administration of the Home for Needy Confederate Women, a large residential building for destitute female relatives of Confederate veterans for over 50 years. The collection includes administrative files, applicant and resident files, and financial files, among other related ephemera.

This collection documents a portion of the life of Lizzie Edmund Boyd and the history of her home, The Oaks, during her ownership from 1927 until the transfer of ownership to the VMFA in 1975. In addition, the lives of several of her family members, namely James Boyd Phillips and Asa Phillips, can be seen through official military documents, tax forms, bank records and personal correspondence, offering a glimpse into their time serving in WWII and assimilation back into society after the war's end. The contents of the collection can perhaps be best summarized in a portion from a memo from Records Manager Jennie Runnels to Director Katherine Lee on April 7, 1995: "Dr. Brownell believes these [papers] would be an exciting topic and important to recovering Richmond's rich architectural history. The boxes contain drawings of the gardens surrounding the Oaks and possibly reference sources used for their redesign, in addition to receipts and invoices pertaining to alterations of the house that took place during Miss Boyd's lifetime. The material documents not only the social and cultural fabric of Richmond's past but also the history of a home that is important to the Virginia Museum."