Committed Supporters Establish Critical Exhibition Endowment Fund

Christine and George Henisee joined the Barnes Foundation as the institution prepared to open its doors on the Benjamin Franklin Parkway. In the decade that followed, their engagement with the Barnes has continued to deepen. As they enhanced their membership from the Sustainer level to the Director’s Circle, they became regular attendees at events and participants in the Barnes’s international travel program, most recently joining us to tour Italy and France in June 2022.

In 2019, Christine enrolled in the Barnes–de Mazia Adult Education program, earning a certificate in 2021, and joined the Ambassadors Board, a volunteer committee of champions of the Barnes’s mission. George participated in the Barnes’s horticulture classes, focusing on landscape design. Together, Christine and George have served on the committees for the Barnes Art Ball in 2019, 2021, and 2022.

Most recently, Christine and George made a generous commitment to the Second Century Campaign, combining an outright contribution with a gift in their will to establish the Christine and George Henisee Exhibition Fund. This endowment fund will provide critical support that will sustain, in perpetuity, the Barnes’s efforts to engage, educate, and inspire visitors of all ages through special exhibitions and complementary publications and programming.

“We believe that special exhibitions are critical to the growth of audiences and the visibility of the Barnes on an international stage,” Christine said. “And we are thrilled that our endowment fund will assist the Barnes in maintaining and evolving its reputation as a center for exceptional education and scholarship for years to come.”