When Jacob M. Kaplan sold the Welch Grape Juice Company in 1947, he became one of New York’s foremost philanthropists and established the J.M. Kaplan Fund. His passionate preservationist and cultural activist daughter Joan Kaplan Davidson later took over the fund (1977-1993), which through the years has supported organizations such as the NAACP Legal Defense, the Coalition for the Homeless, Carnegie Hall, and the New School, to name just a few.
On October 29, 2013, Ms. Davidson will be at The Morgan Library & Museum to present the Kaplan’s Fund inaugural book publishing award “The Alice.” (The award is named after her mother Alice M. Kaplan, “who loved and collected the illustrated book as a work of art itself and an essential document of a civilized society.”) The Brooklyn Museum will receive the first Alice (an award of $25,000) for Youth & Beauty: Art of the American Twenties, edited by curator Teresa A. Carbone. The 304-page book (published by Skira Rizzoli, 2011) features more than 200 “iconic and surprising” works of Edward Hopper, Georgia O’Keeffe, Marsden Hartley, Man Ray, Walker Evans, and others. The Alice recipient was selected by a stellar group of art book aficionados: Paula Cooper, William M. Griswold (Director of the Morgan), publisher Gianfranco Monacelli, Jock Reynolds (Director of Yale University Gallery), and legendary designer Massimo Vignelli.
Philanthropists Jacob and Alice Kaplan
