About the Gallery
William Rolland Stadium and Gallery of Fine Art is the newest addition to the athletics complex on north campus. The two-story stadium, completed in fall 2011, has 2,000 fixed seats, an artificial turf field and outdoor sports lighting for football, soccer and intramural matches. Included in the 16,000-square-foot facility is the William Rolland Gallery of Fine Art, which houses pieces of bronze statuary, paintings and other items from Bill Rolland's collection.
About the Collector
Rolland started as a collector in the mid-1950s, buying a 500 pound bronze statue of a boy on an electrical generator by turn-of-the-century German sculptor Hugo Kaufmann, a tribute to Germany's power industry.
Besides bronzes – including some large, muscular sculptures from the home of Elizabeth Taylor – the collection has Murano glass, oil and watercolor paintings, winning Indianapolis racing cars from three eras, and other high-performance cars. Additional curiosities include a letter penned by Mark Twain.
The gallery contains only a small part of the collection, which Rolland and his longtime companion Kay Green are still assembling. He intends to donate it to CLU over time.
