A Lasting Gift for the Place That Made Them Feel They Belonged

Neil and Juanita Hartbarger make an estate commitment to support the Driskell Center’s collections.

By Jessica Weiss ’05

When Juanita Hartbarger first encountered African American art in college, she began discovering artists and stories she had never been taught.

Years later, that early interest would become a shared passion with her husband, Neil. Together, they immersed themselves in the Washington region’s arts community, attending lectures and exhibitions and building a collection of African American art.

Before long, they found themselves in the orbit of David C. Driskell. The renowned artist, scholar and Distinguished University Professor Emeritus would catch sight of them and extend an arm, inviting them to join him in conversation. 

That simple act of generosity grew into a decades-long relationship with Driskell and his wife, Thelma, and a lasting connection to the David C. Driskell Center at the University of Maryland, where the couple became deeply involved.

“We were not significant, we didn’t have a lot of art in our house—but David treated us the same way that he treated people who had known him for years,” Juanita said. “He saw that we cared, that we were interested, that we wanted to learn. He welcomed us.”

Now, as the Driskell Center celebrates its 25th anniversary, the Hartbargers have made a planned gift that will create enduring support for the center’s collections. Their bequest represents their entire estate, including more than 50 works of art. Named in honor of David and Thelma Driskell, it will establish funds to support conservation, new acquisitions and staff expertise.

The gift supports Forward: The University of Maryland Campaign for the Fearless, a $2.5 billion fundraising initiative that aims to expand access to UMD’s world-class education, accelerate groundbreaking research and unite a global community to Do Good.

“If we are going to have any sort of legacy, we knew it had to be in support of something that’s had a significant impact on our lives,” Juanita said. “There’s simply no place like the Driskell Center.”

The Hartbargers’ relationship with David and Thelma Driskell extended beyond art. They often saw echoes of their own partnership in the warmth and affection the Driskells shared. 

One memorable evening, Neil and Juanita welcomed David and Thelma into their home for dinner. David looked up at a drawing by Lois Mailou Jones and a print by James Lesesne Wells and remarked, “Oh, you have my two teachers”—a moment the Hartbargers still recall with awe.

“We felt he blessed our collection,” Juanita said.

In 2019, they were invited to participate in the Driskell Center’s exhibition “Uncommon Collections,” for which they loaned four works spanning decades of African American artistic practice—from Jones’ 1938 “The Umbrella Vendor” to E. J. Montgomery’s 2008 “Garden of Wildflowers”—and reflected on their journey as collectors. Neil also joined a panel discussion with fellow collectors and longtime supporters of the center.

“We kept thinking, ‘You want little us?’ It was a strange feeling,” Neil said. “But when I looked around at that panel, I realized I was surrounded by people who had become my friends.”

Then, for the 2022 “Telling Our Story” exhibition, the pair selected works from the Driskell Center’s permanent collection and wrote personal letters to the artists behind them, embracing an invitation to engage with the lives, histories and experiences the works represent.

In her letter to renowned artist Samella Lewis about her print “Stimulant_2,” which depicts a mother embracing her son, Juanita wrote of seeing reflections of her own father and grandmother in the work. Her grandmother, a sharecropper who could not read, found someone to teach her son to read—a gift that changed the course of his life. Juanita thanked Lewis for “making an image that allows me to celebrate the heroism, courage, and hard work of my father and grandmother.”

“When I come to the Driskell Center—with its sculpture, with its prints, with its paintings, with its installations—I’m surrounded by my stories,” Juanita said. 

The Hartbargers have seen the center become increasingly “active, expansive and dynamic,” Neil said. And they’ve especially come to appreciate what happens “under the hood”: the conservation, preservation, research and collections care that make its mission possible.

Jordana Moore Saggese, director of the Driskell Center, called that the “unseen work” that makes the center’s public-facing programs possible.

“This gift strengthens the foundation on which everything else at the Driskell Center rests,” she said. “Without that infrastructure, the legacies we steward simply can't endure. The Hartbargers’ commitment to that quieter, essential work reflects a real grasp of how a center like ours sustains itself.”

The gift, she said, provides the kind of long-term stability that allows the center to plan for that work across generations, not just seasons.

And that’s exactly the Hartbargers’ wish: that the Driskell Center continue to be a haven for Black art and the community that loves it just as they do. 

“Our ultimate hope is that we can support the infrastructure of preserving African American art, disseminating African American art and conserving African American art,” Juanita said.

Photos by Taneen Momeni.