Contributing to the fine arts doesn’t take much. Whether it’s a small town gallery or a big city art museum, the arts accepts contributions of various means. This is something that fine arts appreciator and benefactor Baryn Futa knows well. The arts community thrives when funding matches their output -- when dollars and donations come in, supporting those who dream and create artworks. But attendance and appreciation also are welcome. Futa is a prominent arts appreciator and he encourages others to back the arts similarly. Artists are often underpaid and museums have received decreased money since the recession occurred in 2012, and even longer than that in some circumstances. But Baryn Futa can attest that the arts is a vital vein to communities everywhere and appreciation of various kinds can allow this creative world to continue, to grow and to foster more artists in the future.

Obviously, while almost everyone appreciates the arts on some level, not everyone is in a position to support the arts to the extent that is needed, which is why Baryn Futa is trying to pick up the slack and take on as much of the responsibility that he can. While he sees the arts as a great cause that benefits all of society, he also sees it as a profitable and useful investment.

Baryn Futa feels that the arts are a necessary and defining part of any culture and they are important enough to preserve for future generations. The art of the past puts us in touch with our ancestors in a way that nothing else can, and we owe it to our descendants to preserve as much of that as possible for the future. That makes art and art museums extremely important.

Baryn Futa didn't always have such a deep appreciation for the arts. In fact, it wasn't until he retired and began working with the Denver Art Museum that he began to appreciate the importance of art. No one was more surprised than he was to feel such a deep attraction to the art world. He used his time at the DAM to cultivate his love of the arts and art history by attending art fairs and museum exhibitions and anything else he could find. He also attended numerous arts classes and started his own art collection, which has grown to be very extensive and impressive.

These days, Baryn Futa holds memberships in a great number of prominent art museums with impressive collections of their own, including The Metropolitan Museum of Art, the Guggenheim, and The Jewish Museum. He also routinely loans pieces from his own collection to museums because he wants more people to appreciate the arts as much as he does.