By Chicago Times Magazine –

November 25, 2021

The Henry Ford announced on November 16 the purchase of the Lillian F. Schwartz Collection. The Schwartz collection, which includes over 5,000 2D and 3D items, includes artwork, personal papers, photographs, books, and other items from Schwartz’s childhood to later career. Lillian Schwartz is best known for her pioneering work in computer generated art and computer-aided art analysis. Throughout her career, she created groundbreaking film, video, animation, special effects, virtual reality, and multimedia works of art. 

“A true visionary, Lillian broke barriers and mastered an art-form, at a time when the average person didn’t own a computer. While Lillian Schwartz’s work has been admired and displayed by museums before, it is a great honor to be the official home of her collection and preserve her unique and inspiring story moving forward.” said Patricia Mooradian, president and CEO, The Henry Ford. 

Schwartz was born in Cincinnati in 1927, her mother encouraged her creativity from an early age. She experimented with painting, drawing, and sculpture in her early artistic practice before turning to technology to extend and bring her artwork to life. Schwartz’s sculpture “Proxima Centauri” was chosen for The Museum of Modern Art’s “The Machine at the End of the Mechanical Age” exhibition in 1968. 

Schwartz then transitioned her work into the computer realm, serving as one of the first resident artists at AT&T Bell Laboratories (1969-2002) and later as a consultant for A&T, IBM, and Lucent Technologies. 

Schwartz developed effective techniques for the use of computers in film and animation on her own and in collaboration with leading scientists, engineers, physicists, and psychologists. Throughout her career, she created programs, special color filters and editing techniques, art and historical analyses, art films, and graphics that could be viewed in 2D or 3D with no pixel shifting. 

The collection is currently on display at The Henry Ford and is being digitized for online access. Furthermore, The Henry Ford is collaborating with a number of organizations interested in displaying Schwartz’s work at their own locations.