Franci Neely says she's always been drawn to art. The Houston philanthropist spent her childhood days composing elaborate stories and plays, then sharing those original tales with an eager audience of neighborhood children. Neely explains that although she didn't pursue performing arts beyond college, it's still a passion of hers, and she says she now enjoys giving back to the arts philanthropically.
Once a partner at Susman Godfrey LLP, the University of Texas at Austin School of Law graduate spent more than 20 years as a business litigator. She shares that the experience taught her the importance of selecting a theme, sticking with a theme, and developing that theme.
Neely is on the boards of Moody Center for the Arts and Rice University's Baker Institute for Public Policy. The Texan also helped found the Houston Cinema Arts Society and is also on the Menil Foundation board of trustees. The Menil Collection art museum in Houston offers free admission to all and myriad ongoing exhibitions.
According to menil.org, the Menil Collection encompasses nearly 19,000 works of art from the prehistoric era to the present day, including Arts of the Ancient World, Arts of Africa, Medieval and Byzantine art collections.
Franci Neely attended the Studio Menil Fun & Games gala in April. Paper City magazine reported that she gifted everyone at her table with Cameroon national football team jerseys she picked up during a recent trip to West Africa. Neely paired her green jersey with a Christan Dior Book Tote with bright green and fluorescent orange D-Jungle Pop embroidery.
Menil Collection director Rebecca Rabinow told Paper City that the event's theme was a nod to how games have influenced artists' work over the centuries.
Franci Neely's Photo Collection Is a Snapshot of Being a Woman
Neely reveals that curating her personal art collection evolved organically. "My photography collection is called Womankind," she says.
She admits she doesn't recall a specific day when it all began because she's been amassing photographs for over 20 years. Her collection consists of many black-and-white images embodying various stages of womanhood. Some she's taken herself, others she found during her travels. All serve as a perpetual reminder of the Houstonian's fondness for art.
"I'm collecting images from all over the world by male and female photographers. It doesn't matter," Neely confides. "But they represent some aspect of womankind. Girlhood, middle hood, old age. Whimsy, serious. All sorts of aspects of women and womankind. I'm very proud of that collection."
"I'm very proud of that collection. I've been helped with that collection so much by Anne Tucker and now Malcolm Daniel, from the Museum of Fine Arts, Houston," Neely says. "Their keen eyes have been indispensable to me. And much of that collection has been pledged to the Museum of Fine Arts in Houston."
While Franci Neely admits she didn't grow up going to museums and seeing visual arts, she says she couldn't imagine her life without art now.
"It certainly has enriched my life as an adult," she muses.
Neely has also been known to peruse local art during her travels to more than 180 countries, including United Arab Emirates, Spain, and England, and she likes to snap her own artistic memories on her Nikon camera, which she rarely leaves home without. She's taken thousands of photographs over the years.
She states that the COVID-19 pandemic helped her appreciate the power of art even more. While live music and art events came to a standstill, she says it was during that time that the arts community got more creative and stretched its reach in new ways. Many of the arts organizations Neely is involved with adopted virtual arts programming to keep inspiration alive during the tumultuous times of COVID-19.
"Living in the time of pandemic taught us a great deal," Neely declares. "The arts community learned how to reach broader and more diverse audiences through streamed performances and curated tours and lectures. Those will continue even as we again experience the electricity of live performances and up-close views of original works of art."
As founder of the Houston Cinema Arts Society, she says she's currently focusing on inspiring the Houston film industry. Some of Hollywood's most memorable movies were shot entirely or partially in Houston, such as Terms of Endearment, Reality Bites, Urban Cowboy, Pearl Harbor, RoboCop 2, and Armageddon.
She also launched her own organization, the Franci Neely Foundation, to benefit performing, literary, and visual arts. Over the years, the generous contributor has learned the significance of giving larger donations to fewer causes to make more of an impact.
"If you sprinkle a little around to too many, only a slight difference is made," Neely told medium.com.
In addition to supporting the arts, Franci Neely has been a benefactor of the Hermann Park Conservancy in Houston, making a $250,000 contribution to the conservancy in the names of her grandchildren Emma, Ford, and Beau Thompson. She's also been an "angel giver" to many, even offering a donation to a man who required assistance for his mother's medical care.
Giving Back With Gratitude
Helping others is something Franci Neely feels is a blessing and a privilege to be able to do. She has cited helping others through philanthropy as one of her favorite ways to spend money. "I want to make a difference in that way," she adds. "I view it as almost a moral obligation when one has been fortunate."
Neely says she hopes supporting the arts and other important causes inspires others to follow suit. "Winston Churchill said, 'We make a living by what we get. We make a life by what we give,'" Neely says.
Neely has also been a board member of other nonprofits such as Houston Grand Opera, Bo's Place, an organization dedicated to helping children who have suffered the loss of a loved one, Houston Center for Contemporary Craft, and Communities in Schools of Houston. In addition to Texas, she is also a frequent philanthropist in the Nantucket, Massachusetts, community.
"When I think about those I have given back to, they've always given me more in return," she says.
