The University of Michigan has announced a gift to its Museum of Art (UMMA) valued at more than $12 million, making it the largest gift of art in the university’s history. 

The Lo Chia-Lun Calligraphy Collection, donated by Lo Chia-Lun’s daughter Jiu-Fong Lo Chang and her husband Kuei-sheng Chang, will contribute significantly to contemporary scholarship on Yuan and Ming dynasty calligraphy. It represents a major contribution to the study of Chinese cultural history, as it includes masterpieces by Yang Weizhen (1296-1370), Wang Shouren (1472-1529), Wen Zhengming (1470-1559), and Wang Duo (1592-1652), among others, as well as pieces from many cultural leaders of the early twentieth century, including Cai Yuanpei (1868-1940), Chen Duxiu (1879-1942), and Shen Yinmo (1883-1971), and later artists Xu Beihong (1895-1953) and Zhang Daqian (1899-1983).

The gift to UMMA is the result of a long relationship between the Lo family and U-M, and builds on their history of philanthropy including previous gifts of Chinese art. Lo Chia-Lun’s wife, Djang Wei-djen (MA ’27), earned a master’s degree in political science at U-M on a Barbour Scholarship—one of U-M’s oldest and most prestigious awards, offering funding to female students from Asia and the Middle East since 1917. Their daughters, Jiu-Fong Lo Chang (MA ’57, PhD candidate) and Jiu-Hwa Lo Upshur (MA ’61, PhD ’72), also attended graduate school at U-M as Barbour Scholars; their son-in-law, Kuei-sheng Chang (MA ’50, PhD ’55), earned a master’s degree and doctorate in geography from U-M. In the past decade, Jiu-Hwa Lo Upshur has endowed a scholarship in her father’s name at the Rackham Graduate School and created internship endowments at UMMA.

“The addition of the Lo Chia-Lun Collection will be transformative for UMMA’s Asian art program,” said UMMA director Christina Olsen. “It will significantly deepen UMMA‘s holdings of Chinese calligraphy and will add depth and perspective to other UMMA artworks, enabling a more complete portrayal of Chinese art for museum visitors. UMMA is extremely grateful to continue the legacy of the Lo family and to share this rich and beautiful collection with the world.”

(Photo Caption & Credit: Wen Zhengming (1470 - 1559), Twelve Poems (detail), Ming dynasty, album of twenty-six leaves, ink on paper, 9 ¼ x 6 ⅛ inches (each page), Gift of Jiu-Fong Lo Chang and Kuei-sheng Chang, University of Michigan Museum of Art)