Duryea Museum - Private Single-Artist Museum in Beeville, Texas - gateway to the South Texas Coastal Bend.

A Private Museum

of art show casing a 1852 renovated Spanish Mediterranean style home with a spacious Studio and beautiful Gallery on grounds landscaped for the South Texas area since 1996.

A specialized Museum, Private Single-Artist Museum, continues the historic tradition of European artist studios, where the evolution of a lifetime career of one artist is paramount, offering a place for quiet contemplation and study. This was the inspiration for establishing the Duryea Studios in 1996; the Home, Studios and landscape offering the possibility to witness the evolution of the creative process of a single artist during a lifetime. Inspired and influenced by Nana with Love.

The hours are by reservation only and are for visiting the Studio, Gallery and Grounds at this time. Future expansion is in the process of opening the home which houses a significant Private Collection. Work is underway daily.

Duryea Museum mission is to illuminate the creative process and how art and artist transform our experiences and understanding of the world and how we live in it. Duryea Museum is also a space for creativity and inspiration, and is blessed and honored to be a creative destination for art enthusiast.

Duryea Museum contains a collection like no other that engages the whole person, head, hands, heart and soul. Jayne Duryea as a Transcendental Meditator for over years, works in many media be it paint, hot glass, steel or found objects. Expression and content of the essence of the creative process and experience is the most important to her. To live an inspired life. Art is life and life is Art — it is all the same to her now.

Le Jardin Du Monsieur Frank Avery Wilson Le Jardin Du Monsieur - Jayne and Booie in Studio I

Le Jardin Du Monsieur

An expression capturing the essence of a wonderful garden in Chateauneuf de Grasse, a small village in the south of France. During my six month Sabbatical to France in 1993, Paris and this particular location were the most inspiring.

The garden belonged to Mr. Frank Avery Wilson, an English Abstract Action Painter in the 1950’s and his wife, Ms. Ivey Wilson, a Weaver and an artist in her own right.

During this time, Frank was eagerly writing his fifth book on the Quantum Study of Art and Science. As they left to return to Norway for the Spring, he had given me the key to the garden, opening a breath of creativity before me.

The gate depicted on one of the panels shows the 20 foot step walk up, to the garden. Over the old stone wall spread the rolling foot hills of the French Alps toward the Mediterranean Sea where one can see as far as from the southern coast of Italy to the village of Saint Tropez.

My expression was to capture the dazzling color and dappled light of this particular garden along with the cool subtle breeze of the Mediterranean Sea.

Essence, so to speak~ Duryea 2018

Le Jardin Du Monsieur Frank Avery Wilson - oil on canvas

Studio I

Studio II – Gallery

Backyard Spring Light It is Clear to Me Now Early Morning Light

CHEZ Moi Series

On display in the gallery. The Chez Moi series are oil on canvas paintings of special locations on the Duryea Museum grounds at different times of the day and particular lighting conditions, en plen air.

Also, Hot Blown and Sculptured Glass works available for viewing.

During your visit, plan to see Berclair Mansion Museum, McClanahan House Museum, Beeville Art Museum and more in the beautiful South Texas area.

Private Art Museums

– those that are privately funded – have been opening globally at an unprecedented pace in the last 20 years. Collectors often invest decades and vast sums to acquire artwork, often with a special focus or nationality. Rather than donate to a museum that might exhibit some of the work some of the time, many are now opting to build unique museums to keep their collections intact and share it with the public.

Documentary of Artist

Oral history interview conducted for research for “The Story of the Rockport-Fulton Art Colony: How A Coastal Texas Town Became An Art Enclave,” to be published by Texas A&M University Press in Spring, 2021. All proceeds from the book benefit the History Center for Aransas County, Rockport, Texas.

Kay Betz, Interviewer and Co-Author with Vickie Merchant
Tom Betz, Film Director
History Center for Aransas County, Rockport, Texas
Elsa Mathews, Rockport Center for the Arts
April 25, 2016

The Artist interview with Jayne Duryea video:

Here is a link to this video.