Background on Eli and Edythe Broad

Eli and Edythe Broad have been listed among the top art collectors in the world by ArtNews and Art and Antiques magazines. Since the early 1960s, they have built a personal collection of over 400 modern and contemporary works, while The Broad Art Foundation, which they founded in Santa Monica in 1984, has amassed more than 750 artworks by more than 100 artists. The Broad Art Foundation operates an active "lending library" of its extensive collection and has loaned artworks to more than 400 museums and university galleries worldwide.

Through their dedication to venture philanthropy, the Broads engage wide-ranging areas of concern in the arts, education and science nationwide. In 1999, The Broad Foundation was established with a mission to dramatically improve urban K-12 public education through better governance, management and labor relations. In its first five years, the Foundation has committed over $100 million to support new ideas and innovative leadership in the nation's largest urban school systems.

The Broads have strongly supported numerous universities and colleges, particularly in regard to teaching and research in art, biotechnology and business. The Broad Art Center at the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA), designed by architect Richard Meier, is currently under construction and will house painting, sculpture and ceramics studios for art students, as well as a gallery, library and café. In June 2003, in partnership with the Massacheusetts Institute of Technology, Harvard University and Whitehead Institute, the Broads announced a founding gift of $100 million to create The Eli and Edythe Broad Institute for biomedical research and help realize the promise of the human genome. The Broads also have provided funding for new buildings at the California Institute of the Arts (CalArts) in Valencia; the California Institute of Technology (CalTech); Pitzer College in Claremont, California; and Michigan State University, from which Mr. Broad graduated cum laude in 1954 and where The Eli Broad College of Business and The Eli Broad Graduate School of Management were endowed in 1991.

Eli Broad has been an important patron and board member at more than 25 major museums and art institutions, including the Museum of Modern Art, the Whitney Museum of American Art and the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, all in New York; The Los Angeles County Museum of Art (LACMA); and the Archives of American Art of The Smithsonian Institution in Washington, D.C. Mr. Broad was founding chairman of the board of trustees of The Museum of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles and is currently a trustee and member of the executive committee of LACMA. Most recently, the Broads announced a major gift to LACMA to create a new building for contemporary art.