Ursula 16 Bundle

This beautifully paired collection places the art of collecting through a lens of sustained care—tracing the threads of relationship, community, and memory that run through fifty years of one woman's singular vision.

At its center is 'Destiny Is a Rose', the catalogue accompanying Eileen Harris Norton's landmark exhibition at Hauser & Wirth Los Angeles. Beginning with a single print acquired from Ruth Waddy in 1976, Harris Norton's collection has grown into a profound testament to women artists, artists of color, and California’s creative community. With essays by Kellie Jones and Ingrid Schaffner illuminating the roles of education, philanthropy, and deep personal bonds with artists, the book is as much a portrait of a life lived alongside art as it is a record of the works themselves.

Ursula Issue 16 deepens that portrait in the magazine's first cover story devoted to a collector. Here we encounter Harris Norton in candid conversation with Mark Bradford as they reflect on their decades-long relationship, shared experiences growing up in Los Angeles, and commitment to activism. In the conversation, originally published as part of The Forgotten Her Story—an online platform that celebrates womanhood, craftsmanship, and the handmade—Harris Norton says, “Art isn’t separate from the lives around it; it’s the relationship, the history, the memories.”

Together, these two volumes form an intimate diptych on what it means to champion art not as acquisition but as commitment—essential reading for anyone moved by the idea that collecting, at its most generous, is itself a creative act.