John R. Eckel Jr. (October 22, 1951 – November 13, 2009) was an American businessman and art collector. He was the founder, CEO, and chairman of Houston-based Copano Energy.

Biography

Eckel was born on October 22, 1951, in Houston and graduated from Columbia University in 1973. After graduating, he worked for the

Mutual Life Insurance Company of New York The Mutual Life Insurance Company of New York (also known as Mutual of New York or MONY) was the oldest continuous writer of insurance policies in the United States. Incorporated in 1842, it was headquartered at 1740 Broadway, before becoming a wh ...

and Lehman Brothers before joining the energy sector, working for various energy drilling, service and E&P companies. Eckel founded Copano Energy in 1992 and served as its president and CEO until April 2003, when he became chairman and CEO. Under his tenure, the company grew from having a 23-mile pipeline to a publicly trading midstream natural gas company with more than 6,000 miles of pipeline and seven processing plants across four states. He died in 2009 after suffering liver failure.

Art collection

Eckel is most known for his art collection, which focused on a few American designers and artists, including Paul Evans, Harry Bertoia, Edward Ruscha, and

Edward Wormley Edward J Wormley (December 31, 1907 – November 3, 1995) was an American designer of modern furniture. In 1926 he went to study briefly at the Art Institute of Chicago. Funds ran out and he went to work as an interior designer for Marshall Fields ...

. After his death, his eponymous foundation has been focusing on supporting art groups and other charities, and his collection went to the Whitney Museum of American Art and the

Museum of Fine Arts, Houston The Museum of Fine Arts, Houston (MFAH), is an art museum located in the Houston Museum District of Houston, Texas. With the recent completion of an eight-year campus redevelopment project, including the opening of the Nancy and Rich Kinder Build ...

(MFAH). He is the namesake of the John R. Eckel, Jr. Foundation Gallery on the first floor of the newly opened Whitney Museum. His collection was the subject of a 2012 exhibition titled ''The Spirit of Modernism: The John R. Eckel, Jr. Foundation Gift to the Museum of Fine Arts, Houston,'' held at the MFAH. As art collector, he was praised for having a "wonderfully holistic vision of a moment in time" by the museum's curators and for being a "brilliant, largely self-directed collector" by the '' Houston Chronicle''.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Eckel, John R. Jr. 1951 births 2009 deaths Columbia University alumni American businesspeople in the oil industry American chief executives American art collectors Lehman Brothers people Businesspeople from Houston