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The Scarab Club has close to 100 paintings in its collection with as many as 20 works on view at any given moment. There are also three murals, important to the organization’s history, located throughout the building.
The Walter Piper Purchase Prize Exhibition served as an early and successful way to build the Scarab Club’s permanent collection. This exhibition was first held in 1925 at the 253 East Forest clubhouse (the clubhouse prior to the present location) and the top award of $200 was donated by Walter Piper.
The vetting process was an interesting and fair exercise, in that the 18 examples were selected for the show and voted on during a dinner. In December 1925, The Scarab (Bulletin) reported, “The first ballot included the votes of all the Artist members present at the dinner and chose the following three highest in the estimation of the present…On the second ballot only the contestants, with the exception of the three above named [John Morse, George Styles, and Arthur Marschner], were allowed to vote…”
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