To build Seattle U’s new 12th Ave SUMA art museum, some of its promised collection is being sold off

Gaetano Gandolfi, The Birth of Venus –
 Estimate: $2-3 million (Image: Sotheby’s)

SUMA

As the plan moves forward to build a new art museum on its 12th Ave campus, Seattle University has announced a change in plans for some of the $300 million in art pledged to be showcased there in a donation by Seattle property developer Dick Hedreen.

“Longtime Seattle University supporter and donor Richard Hedreen recently informed the university of his decision to sell approximately 50 works from the broader collection,” the school’s September 14th announcement read. “As Sotheby’s Auction House announces the sale this morning, we wanted the university community to hear this news directly from us. Mr. Hedreen reaffirmed his commitment to gifting the remaining approximately 350 works of art to the university in honor of his late wife, Betty Hedreen, a proud Seattle University alumna.”

The announcement follows Hedreen’s 2024 donation pledging the $300 million collection of paintings, pottery, photography, etchings, and sculptures to the Jesuit university. The donation included a promise of $25 million in “seed funding” to build a new Seattle University Museum of Art to house the collection.

That funding, it turns out, will come from paring down the collection. Hedreen says the sales are happening “to translate our pledge into a gift realizable in the near term,” according to the auction announcement from Sotheby’s.

Proceeds from the auction are projected to exceed $90 million to support construction of the museum and the infrastructure needed to protect the collection.

The Tom Kundig-designed SUMA is being designed as a four-story, 44,000-square-foot facility on 12th Ave. It was planned to begin construction this year in time for a 2028 opening but Seattle U has not made any announcements about a groundbreaking or a final budget.

Seattle U artists and members of the Seattle theater community have raised concerns about the school’s plans to demolish its Lee Center for the Arts to make way for the museum.

The paring will roll out across Sotheby’s Contemporary and Modern sales in November 2026, culminating in a dedicated Old Masters auction in New York in February. Marquee lots include Roy Lichtenstein’s *Reflections on “Painter and Model”* ($20M–$30M), Georg Pencz’s *Portrait of Sigismund Baldinger* ($8M–$12M), Bartolomeo Cavarozzi’s *The Sacrifice of Isaac* ($7M–$10M), Cecily Brown’s *Untitled (Shipwreck)* ($7M–$10M), and Titian’s *The Mater Dolorosa* ($4M–$6M).

Despite the upcoming auctions, the university’s permanent collection will retain masterpieces spanning six centuries, including works by Jacopo Pontormo, Agnolo Bronzino, Élisabeth Vigée Le Brun, Thomas Gainsborough, Willem de Kooning, Amy Sherald, and Rashid Johnson.

Campus officials said that SUMA planning remains ongoing in consultation with the Hedreen family, with further updates expected in “coming months.”

$5 A MONTH TO HELP KEEP CHS PAYWALL-FREE

Subscribe to CHS to help hire writers and photographers to cover the neighborhood. CHS is a pay what you can community news site with no required sign-in or paywall. To stay that way, we need you. Become a subscriber to help us cover the neighborhood for $5 a month — or choose your level of support