Review

Carol and Todd Haenisch Have a Philosophical System to Support Local Contemporary Artists

Todd and Carol Haenisch pose with My Mind by Mac McClanahan, 2005, which lately was accepted by the city of Leawood, Kansas, as a gift. To the right is a maquette for one of James Woodfill’s Freighthouse District sculptures.

Carol and Todd Haenisch collect. They collect painting, sculpture, antiquities, furniture — they collect artists. More than simply a love of art motivates them; they feel a sense of responsibility and of gratitude. “There is no way we could have done this without the generosity of the artists,” says Todd Haenisch. They have a 500-year plan to impact the lives of people in the future by preserving the art of our culture for them. “We don’t feel like we own all this work,” says Todd. “We are just the custodians.”

Sculptures by James Woodfill, Mac McClanahan, and John Northington grace the front of the couple’s home in Leawood, Kansas, along with a wall sculpture by Jesse Small. In the tile-covered foyer, an assemblage by Doug Schwietert titled Charity incorporates the international Red Cross symbol and foreshadows the impact of the work in the next room. An almost physical force — a kind of gravity generated by the large body of work — draws people into the room that the Haenisches call the socio-cultural room. The walls and floors are covered with art; shelves are packed; paintings and assemblages lean three and four deep in stacks against the wall; a mid-19th-century Chinese money changer’s bed tries to dominate the room. A case holds shelf after shelf of figures representing Saint Simon (the patron saint of bad habits) and pottery collected in Latin America.

Some sculptures and paintings in the Haenisches’ collection include Mary Ann Strandell’s Plaid Orb, 2004, a 3D lenticular print on Sintra from The Polyglot Series (center), an untitled 1992 painting by David Ford (left, floor), James Woodfill’s Forced Oscillator, 1996, Jesse Christopher’s Black Meat, 2008, and Mark Cowardin’s 2005 Solid Gold Faucet.

There is some organization. The south wall is filled with art that has something to say: seven pieces by Stretch hang in a column. Called Stamps, each piece depicts a gun. Lori Raye Erickson’s assemblage, hanging adjacent, comments on mass murder (Erickson is the Haenisches’ favorite female Kansas City artist — they have more than 100 of her pieces). A large painting by Jay Norton jogs the memory with the old Maybelline slogan, “Maybe she’s born with it,” painted under a woman in a burqa in front of an American flag motif. Eleven assemblage boxes by Mott-ly with titles such as Choke on a Wing, Box of Chocolates my Ass, and Slaybells ring and Fucking Humbug precede David Ford’s Wrong, an image painted on striped fabric hanging over another flag by Jay Norton. In the corner, a Ken Ferguson pot has a rare solitary spot on a small table. Nearby, Jim Leedy platters hang next to shelves displaying some of his early pots, along with Nate Fors’ first inner tube diptych, early clay work by Jesse Small, and various antiquities.

Both Todd and Carol were born into families who respect the place art holds in our lives. Carol’s father, Bob Fay, was president of the Albrecht-Kemper Museum of Art in Saint Joseph, Missouri, in the 1990s, and her mother, Susan Fay, is a painter. Carol took lessons from Kansas City artist Philomene Bennett at the Albrecht-Kemper as a child. Much of her early collecting, other than her mother’s work, happened at end-of-semester student sales at the Kansas City Art Institute. Todd’s mother, Sari, taught him to collect art at an early age, too. “I was 8 years old when my mother took me to the starving artists shows in Overland Park,” he says. By his teens, he had moved on to collecting limited-edition prints by artists such as Salvador Dali, Marc Chagall, Joan Miró, and Alexander Calder — they decorated the walls of his dorm room at Westminster College in Fulton, Missouri.

Now the Haenisches almost exclusively collect local artists (and artists who show locally). “The moment I bought my first piece from local artist Stretch,” Todd says, “It changed my life — forever.” They bought many more pieces from him. Dick Belger, who founded the Belger Arts Center in Kansas City, Missouri, has been an influence on the Haenisches by modeling the collecting of multiple works from the same artist. Todd says, “If you collect one piece of every artist, then you are an art collector. If you collect a second piece from that artist, you are a collector of that artist, but when you get a third piece from the same artist, you become a patron, and that is what it is all about.”

Jay Norton’s Maybe She’s Born With It, surrounded by works by Lori Raye Erickson, José Ika, Mott-ly, Patricia Reed, Jeremy McConnell and others in the Haenisches’ collection.

Every bedroom and bathroom, the great room, sunroom, and even the basement of the Haenisch home is crowded with art. There are multiple works by Stretch, Vince Roark, Wilbur Niewald, David Ford, Peregrine Honig, Chris Davis, Eric Sall, Russell Easterwood, Jesse Small, Michael Greathouse, Jesse Christopher, and Ika, work by Rachel Hayes, Nate Fors, Travis Pratt, and by Eric, Holly and Troy Swangstu, each. Also in their collection are works by: Davin Watne, Emily Sall, Dylan Mortimer, Christopher Leitch, Bill Drummond, Allan Winkler, Susan White, Oz McGuire, Anne Pearce, Asheer Akram, Mark Cowardin, Lester Goldman, Warren Rosser, Archie Scott Gobber, Debra Smith, David Pier, Tom Gregg, Rhy Trotter, Jimmy Trotter, Gear, Larry McAnany, Mary Ann Strandell, Michael Rees, William S. Burroughs, George Rousis, Annie Woodfill, J’son Meyers and more — too many more to name them all. Carol is in the process of documenting the collection. “I’m trying,” she says. “But it’s a little overwhelming.”

The Haenisches feel that patronage is the gap in the Kansas City art system; they say that there simply are not enough people supporting the local art scene. They believe there are collectors who are head and shoulders above anyone else — the Nermans, Blochs, Oppenheimers, Kempers (Crosby and Sandy), and Halls — but that only a handful of those have focused on local artists or global artists who have shown in Kansas City. “If we could inspire one person — make them understand how important it is to collect, I would be happy,” says Todd. “I would love to help anyone who wants to learn about collecting.”

View of Haenisch home, filled with their artwork collection, including the Jesse Small chandelier at top center, Square Cloud, 2007.

The great collectors tend to be the entrepreneurs, even the artist-collectors. Todd says among the artists with the best collections in Kansas City are Chris Davis, Peregrine Honig, David Ford, and Stretch. “It is an expected wage for the artist to sell their work,” says Todd. “Artistic independence is the idea that artists can sustain themselves economically based on producing and selling art. I am hopeful that the collectors will catch up.”

Carol and Todd Haenisch buy art when it speaks to them. “It is about making the art sustainable,” says Todd. “It is easy to buy art when you are buying it based on what color it is, where you’re going to put it or how much it costs, but museums are full of work that has dialog — it is about something.” When Todd first purchased 40 Machine Guns by Jesse Small, for example, it was a tribute to the number of U.S. military who had died in Iraq. “Now, there are over 100 dead for each gun,” he says with reverence. There is art in the Haenisch home about pollution, guns, and death — even art with heroin spoons. If the subject is important, the couple is willing to be uncomfortable. “I want to support the artist in making their statements,” says Todd. “I like stuff that’s not pretty.”

The Haenisches have been Review Studios artist patrons of Warren Rosser.

Janell Meador is a librarian, proofreader, and occasional contributor to Review.

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