History — 1960s

James Lewis Haseltine is hired as the first paid and professionally trained director of the Salt Lake Art Center, furthering the goals and rigor of the organization. SLAC increases the number of original exhibitions, and for the first time, prints exhibition catalogues.

The Rental Sales Gallery program begins, allowing the community to rent and purchase artwork. The program, a common practice among art museums of the era, serves to show that art acquisition is accessible to would-be collectors.

Partnering with public television through the program, “The Way of Art,” SLAC finds a wider audience to explore artistic concepts and exhibition topics.

Recognizing the need for a more specialized and larger arts space, the Center begins to explore plans for a new building.

The 100 Years of Utah Painting exhibition opens with the landmark catalog of the same name. Curated by James L. Haseltine, the show is lauded as “the first time a full-scale survey [has been organized] of Utah painting from the earliest pioneer days to the recent past.”

The first Benefit Art Auction, a tradition that continues today, was organized by the Women’s Alliance of the Salt Lake Art Center.

Salt Lake Art Center unveils a scale model of the proposed new building design on the site of the Finch Lane Gallery space. Not actualized, these efforts foreshadow the new building to come.

Joseph P. Stuart is named executive director and continues to work to expand the existing building or replace it with a new one.

The first annual “Discovery Arts Festival,” a predecessor to the Utah Arts Festival is held in the SLAC Courtyard, sponsored by Salt Lake Art Center Guild. Twilight Concert Series is also later launched in the SLAC Courtyard.