Komal Shah, a prominent art collector, announced the renaming of her Shah Garg Foundation to the Making Their Mark Foundation, coinciding with a three-day forum in Washington, D.C., scheduled for March 2025. The foundation takes its name from the traveling exhibition "Making Their Mark: Works from the Shah Garg Collection," curated by Cecilia Alemani, which highlights women artists from Shah and her husband Gaurav Garg's collection. The forum, held at the Martin Luther King Jr. Memorial Library, will feature panels, keynotes, and performances organized around themes like Visionary Voices and Changemakers, with Alemani as curatorial director and Loring Randolph as director.
The renaming and forum matter because they represent a strategic expansion of Shah's philanthropic efforts to elevate women artists, addressing systemic gender inequality in the art world. By creating a dedicated platform for dialogue on structural change, mentorship, and market visibility, the foundation aims to foster lasting equity and sustainability in the arts. The initiative builds on the success of the traveling exhibition, which has resonated with audiences across the U.S., and reflects a growing trend among collectors to use their resources for advocacy and institutional change.