Collection: Broadmoor Art Academy - Colorado Springs Fine Arts Center

In 1919, the Broadmoor Art Academy was founded with a vision of creating a new art institution of national stature. The Academy was originally located in a converted mansion on the corner of Cascade and Dale in Colorado Springs, Colorado. The building had previously been the home of the school's founders, Spencer and Julie Penrose - the owners of the Broadmoor Hotel. Art instructors and students alike brought their diverse styles and talents to Colorado, lured by the exquisite landscapes that only the west affords.

The Academy engaged prominent artists as instructors including John F. Carlson, Robert Reid, Birger Sandzén, Ernest Lawson, Boardman Robinson, George Biddle, Randall Davey, Ernest Fiene, and Peppino Mangravite. These artists helped to attract a diverse student body and to garner recognition for the Broadmoor Art Academy in the American Art centers of the East and Midwest.

In 1934, the Academy moved in to a new expansive facility with classrooms, studios, a performing arts theater, music room, library, and a number of galleries. From that point forward, the Academy became known as the Colorado Springs Fine Arts Center.

Although it appeared toward the end of the heyday of American art colonies, the Broadmoor Academy and its successor institution, the Colorado Springs Fine Arts Center, functioned for more than a generation as an important cultural center in the Rocky Mountain West. It was a nationally recognized art colony on par with those in Santa Fe, Taos, Woodstock and Provincetown.