Hand-in-Hand Collection

In early 2007, Mattie Rhodes Center acquired the Hand-in-Hand Folk Art Collection.  The collection was started by Alice Ann Biggerstaff, a longtime Hallmark employee, who acquired more than 800 pieces of folk art.  Folk art is typically one-of-a-kind pieces made by artists with little formal artistic training, made from materials found within a specific cultural region and using techniques and styles from that region.

Alice Ann Biggerstaff spent most of her childhood in Liberty, Missouri and graduated from Paseo High School in 1942.  After graduating from William Jewell College in 1949, with some time off from school due to a bout of tuberculosis, she began to follow her artistic interests.  For 37 years she worked at Hallmark creating unique and colorful designs and, in her later years, branching out to three-dimensional items such as gift wrap, candles and Christmas ornaments. 

After her retirement in 1986, Alice Ann began to travel more and spent time in Santa Fe, New Mexico.  Although she never meant to start a collection, she acquired hundreds of pieces of folk art through her world travels and her friendships with people of different cultures.  The "seed" collection encompasses sculpture, ceramics, toys, dolls, masks and textiles.  The strongest areas of the collection are works from Latin America and Hispanic and Pueblo Indian artists of the Southwest.  

Alice Ann donated her large folk art collection to the Greater Kansas City Community Foundation (GKCCF) in 1995 to start the Hand-in-Hand Folk Art Collection.  Mattie Rhodes Center became an active partner of Hand-in-Hand in 1999 when Mattie Rhodes Art Gallery began continuously displaying pieces from the collection in gallery cases. 

In March 2007, the collection was formally gifted to Mattie Rhodes Center. GKCCF provided guidance and served as the legal owner while a new home for the collection was sought. Mattie Rhodes Art Gallery continues to display three cases of Hand-in-Hand folk art during all exhibits and provides educational background material on the collection through brochures and lesson plans for group visits.