Biographical Note
Paul Freeman Stiga was born in 1936 and grew up outside of Boston, Massachusetts. He made frequent trips with his family into the city to see the latest Broadway tryout or touring theatrical production. He credited these trips with instilling in him a life-long love of the stage. He studied English at Tufts University in Boston and moved to New York City to attend Columbia University for graduate school. He remained in New York for several decades to pursue a career in publishing, eventually moving back to Middleborough, Massachusetts. Stiga began collecting theatrical drawings and sketches during the late 1960s. Among his first purchases were works by Beni Montressor, Eugene Berman, and designs from numerous productions of the Ballet Russes. During his lifetime he acquired more than 2,700 works-on-paper dating from the late nineteenth century to the early twenty-first century. Stiga died on August 8, 2019, in Plymouth, Massachusetts.