Fort Worth, TX, December 1, 2011—The Amon Carter Museum of American Art announces it has received a $68,000 grant from the National Endowment for the Arts (NEA) to support a groundbreaking exhibition, titled Color!, that provides the first major analysis of the creation, transformation, realization, and implementation of fine art color photography in the United States. The museum is the recipient of one of 863 NEA grants totaling $22.543 million across the country.

“Art Works is the guiding principle at the NEA,” says agency Chairman Rocco Landesman. “And I’m pleased to see that principle represented through the 863 Art Works-funded projects. These projects demonstrate the imaginative and innovative capacities of artists and arts organizations to enhance the quality of life in their communities.”

The Amon Carter’s Color! exhibition, scheduled to open in September 2013, tells the vivid tale of photographers’ longstanding preoccupation with color; the steady evolution of how photographers developed and used the medium; and the eventual widespread embrace of color photography as an essential tool for documenting and examining people, societies, cultures, and the natural and physical worlds.

“Receiving the NEA grant is a privilege and an honor,” says Andrew Walker, director. “The support will help us create an exhibition that will engage, educate, and provide meaningful arts experiences for our diverse audiences.”

The Amon Carter has an active photography program with one of the country's largest and most important collections of American photographs. The museum devotes two galleries to the display of photographs year-round, and its collection comprises more than 45,000 exhibition-quality photographic prints by more than 700 photographers covering the chronological history of the medium. Additionally, the museum is the repository of the artist archives of Carlotta Corpron, Nell Dorr, Laura Gilpin, Eliot Porter, Erwin E. Smith, and Karl Struss.

For a complete listing of projects recommended for Art Works grant support, please visit the NEA website at arts.gov.