SAARINEN HOUSE:
PRESIDENTS/RESIDENTS, 1946-1994
Welcome to the online exhibition of Saarinen House: Presidents/Residents, 1946—1994. This show examines the artistic work and legacies of the four presidents of Cranbrook Academy of Art that followed Eliel Saarinen: Zoltan Sepeshy, Glen Paulsen, Wallace Mitchell, and Roy Slade. While Saarinen House served as the official home of these presidents from just 1951 to 1990, the exhibition traces their tenures as presidents from 1946 until 1994—a period of seismic social and artistic changes that were reflected in the work and culture of the Academy and reverberated in the rooms of Saarinen House.
Through paintings and drawings on loan from Cranbrook Art Museum (see the Exhibition Checklist), as well as historic photographs and ephemera from Cranbrook Archives, this exhibition surveys the Academy leadership and its student life during the second half of the 20th century.
Presidents/Residents was on display in Saarinen House from April 28 to November 25, 2018. This online exhibition includes and expands on the material in the show, curated by Kevin Adkisson, the Center’s 2016-2019 Collections Fellow and current Curatorial Associate.
Fifty-two male students from Detroit Public Schools came to live and study at Cranbrook in the summer of 1965. Known in its first year as Horizons, the experimental enrichment program was conceived by three Cranbrook Schools faculty—Ben M. Snyder, Robert M. Sandoe, and Robert W. Usellis. Snyder would serve as HUB’s director for 25 years.
Initially made possible through a Ford Foundation grant, Horizons became part of the U.S. Department of Education’s Upward Bound program in 1966. Both programs were designed to assist potential first-generation high school students from low-income families to give them an opportunity to excel in college. With this federal funding, the program changed its name to Horizons-Upward Bound.
HUB experienced a lot of changes and challenges in its first five years, as did the country. The national civil rights movement was in full swing, there was major civil unrest in Detroit and Pontiac, and Bloomfield Hills, like other Detroit suburbs, was rapidly growing.
By 1969 the HUB student body had doubled and included public school students from Detroit, Pontiac, and Oakland County suburbs. The faculty pool transformed from nearly all Cranbrook School faculty to fifty percent Detroit Public Schools faculty, plus interns from Wayne State University. Curriculum and activities expanded, and a winter phase was instituted for tutorial assistance throughout the school year. A scholarship pipeline to Cranbrook School was established, and several special projects were introduced.
International master of egg tempera painting, Sepeshy came to Cranbrook as instructor in painting and led the Academy through its accreditation as a degree-granting institution, formalizing the structure of the Academy.
An architect known for his educational and religious designs, Paulsen maintained his professional practice while instituting major changes to the Academy’s curricula, finances, and faculty during a turbulent moment in history.
Detroit-native Mitchell dedicated his career to Cranbrook, as instructor in painting, director of the Museum, and finally president. Always producing work, he adapted the Academy’s expectations and operations for the times.
Infusing the Cranbrook campus with a new sense of appreciation for its own past, Slade celebrated the campus (including restoring Saarinen House), and brought international attention to the current work of the Academy.
View photographs of the exhibition installation and learn about the exhibition furniture design.
Learn about the president’s works featured in the exhibition.