Comments (0) BEST POSTHUMOUS 100TH BIRTHDAY SHOW - 2006

The Centennial of William Sanderson Kirkland Museum

When Hugh Grant, director of the Kirkland Museum of Fine & Decorative Art, realized that William Sanderson's 100th birthday was going to come and go without an exhibit, he stepped in and presented a retrospective of the artist. It was the first-ever temporary show in the Kirkland's history, and Sanderson was a fitting subject for the honor. Co-curated by Grant and Michael Sanderson, the artist's son, the show examined the career of one of Denver's greatest artists of the '40s and '50s. His style had a cartoonish quality that referred to cubism, and when the art tides changed in the '60s, Sanderson was forgotten. His career was reborn in the '80s -- not because he changed with the trends, but because certain art styles had finally come back around. Sanderson may be dead, but his legacy lives on, thanks to The Centennial of William Sanderson.