Kresge Artist Fellows among those selected as part of new $1.8 million collection

Three newly minted 2011 Kresge Artist Fellows are among the 50 artists who will be represented in a new collection assembled by the University of Michigan’s new C.S. Mott Children’s Hospital and Von Voigtlander Women’s Hospital.

Pieces by Mitch Cope, Heather McGill and Mark Newport were selected by a committee of Mott and U-M Museum of Art administrators, doctors, and patient advocates.

The $1.8 million collection that group assembled will be displayed in gallery space near the main lobby and throughout the 12-story inpatient tower and 8-story outpatient clinical tower. The $754 million facility is scheduled to open in November.

The collection is funded through the support of private donors. Thirty-one of the 50 artists represented in the collection were educated, born in and or have lived in Michigan.

McGill, Cope and Newport are among the visual artists awarded Kresge Fellowships in June.

Every year, 12 to 24 fellowships are awarded to visual, performing and literary artists living and working in Metropolitan Detroit. Each Fellowship includes an unrestricted prize of $25,000 and customized professional practice opportunities. The fellowships are part of the foundation’s Detroit Program, a nine-part framework aimed at helping revitalize Detroit.

The 2011 class of Fellows consists of 11 individual artists and one artist collaborative. Cope is part of that collaborative, called Design 99. McGill is artist-in-residence at the Cranbrook Academy of Art in Bloomfield Hills, Mich., and head of the sculpture department. Newport is artist-in-residence and head of fiber at Cranbrook.

(See a slideshow highlighting the new collection.)