Robert O. Engard
1915–2003
Nationality: American
Affiliations: Spokane Art Center Instructor, Washington Art Association, and Washington Print Association
Robert O. Engard was born in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania and moved to Spokane with his family at a young age. He graduated from Lewis & Clark High School, attended Washington State College, and worked most of his life in the printing trade.
After retiring he taught at Spokane Falls Community College and showed his artwork at the Municipal Art Center in Oklahoma City, the Denver Art Museum, the Oakland Art Museum, and the Seattle Art Museum.
While working for the Spokane Lithographing Company he took classes at the Works Progress Administration’s Spokane Art Center where he studied watercolor under Vanessa Helder. Engard and Helder convinced Spokane Lithographing Company to donate stone lithography equipment to the Center and to allow Art Center students to purchase stones for five dollars each. Engard instructed lithography at the Spokane Art Center from 1939 to 1941. Several of his students went on to work at The Spokesman-Review/Spokane Daily Chronicle.
Robert O. Engard significantly contributed to the Northwest Museum of Arts & Culture’s W.P.A. art collection by donating his own lithographic prints and those by Spokane Art Center students and instructors, and archival records about the Spokane Art Center. He was also an active art docent at the Museum and used his expertise to identify and evaluate WPA artworks in the Museum’s permanent collection.
Sources: Manuscript collections, Joel E. Ferris Research Library and Archives, Northwest Museum of Arts & Culture; Collection records, Northwest Museum of Arts & Culture, Spokane.
For the Reaping and the Sowing
Date: 1938-1941
Image Dimensions: 14 x 9 5/8 inches (image)
Medium: Lithograph
Inscription: “For the Reaping and the Sowing, 2/12,” lower left margin; “Robert O. Engard,” lower right margin
Subjects: landscape and farm
Provenance: Gift of Mrs. Carl Kragelund, 1990.
Collection Number: 3530.2
Grand Coulee Dam Construction
Date: August, 1939
Image Dimensions: 12 x 9 1/4 inches (image)
Medium: Lithograph
Inscription: "Grand Coulee Dam Construction," lower margin; "14/15,", Robert O. Engard - 14," upper right corner, margin
Curator Notes: Robert O. Engard went on a sketching expedition with Vanessa Helder sometime in August of 1939, after which time he produced this print back at the lithography studio at the Spokane Art Center.
Subject: Grant County-Grand Coulee Dam-Construction
Provenance: Gift of Robert O. and Helen Engard, 1995
Collection Number: 3771.1
Rural Spring
Date: 1938-1941
Image Dimensions: 8 1/2 x 12 7/8 inches (image)
Medium: Lithograph
Inscription: “Rural Spring 3/12,” lower left margin; “Robert O. Engard,” lower right margin
Curator Notes: This print was exhibited widely around the United States including shows in Oklahoma, Denver and Seattle after it was produced. It appeared in Tacoma Art Museum's 1989 exhibit, “100 Years of Washington Art,” a survey of art created in Washington during its first 100 years of Statehood.
Subjects: landscape and house
Provenance: Gift of Glenn Mason, 1989.
Collection Number: 3426.2
Swampland Composition
Date: 1938-1941
Image Dimensions: 13 3/4 x 9 7/8 inches (image)
Medium: Lithograph
Inscription: "Swampland Composition, 3/10," lower left margin; "Robert O. Engard," lower right margin
Subject: cattail
Provenance: Gift of Marion Blanc Dammann, 1999
Collection Number: 3455.7