Oil and gas magnate Vernon Faulconer, who was also an avid art collector and philanthropist, died on August 7 at age 76 in Dallas, Texas. The cause of death is unknown.
Faulconer’s company, Vernon E. Faulconer Inc., operates nine wells in the state. He also ran the Faulconer Scholarship Program, which offers financial aid to black and Hispanic college students, and sat on the board of the Dallas Museum of Art from 1998 onward.
The Faulconer collection features work by Anish Kapoor, James Turrell, Julian Schnabel, Ed Ruscha, William Kentridge, Cecily Brown, Kara Walker, John Chamberlain, and several other major names, but Faulconer began his love affair with art by purchasing the work of regional Texas artists.
“Collecting isn’t about price or names,” Faulconer told D Magazine in 2004. “Art is personal; it’s about your reaction. Who am I to tell someone else ’that’s not good,’ or what a work means?”
Inside The Warehouse.
Image: Courtesy The Warehouse.
Along with fellow Dallas Museum of Art board member Howard Rachofsky, Faulconer transformed an 18,000-square-foot storage facility into a gallery space known as The Warehouse, which showcases both of their extensive collections.
“It’s a yours, mine, and ours collection,” Rachofsky said of the space, which opened in 2012, in a 2014 interview with W magazine.
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