For the people, by the people.

"When you have a moment, Mike, I'd like to talk to you about a Flemish painting I'm considering for my own collection," an employee shot over his shoulder as he left the elevator.

"Sure," Michael Bzdak answered. "I'll be around this afternoon."

As curator of Johnson & Johnson's corporate art program, Bzdak gets his share of special requests from employees. But that's part of the mission of J&J's art program: to help employees explore the world of art. To do that, the company comfortably integrates artwork into the offices, the hallways, even the dining rooms at J&J's world headquarters in New Brunswick, New Jersey.

Unlike other companies, J&J doesn't promote its accumulation of artwork as simply a collection. Instead, it places the art under the umbrella of the corporate art program--and it likes to think of J&J employees as "partners" in that program.

To keep the partners involved, Curator Bzdak plans activities that welcome participation. Like letting all the employees choose the art they want for their offices. "If they have a wall," says Bzdak, "they get something." Their choices are pleasantly predictable. The human resources center, for instance, hangs soothing landscapes. The health, safety, and environmental affairs office goes for bright outdoor scenes. The videoconference center opts for screenprints of robot-like figures. And the engineering services department chooses the clean lines of black-and-white photography.

J&J reserves one special area of the headquarters complex for rotating exhibits of art by New Jersey artists. Bzdak explains: "It's a good opportunity for employees to see what's going on in area art, and we'll sometimes purchase a piece from an exhibit for our own collection." That may be why the program is popular with artists, too. Says Bzdak, "We're booked with exhibits for the next three to four years."

Then there's the employee photograph competition. Every year for the past five, J&J has asked the amateur photographers among its 1,200 employees at headquarters to submit their prize photos. Bzdak frames the best for display, and then area professionals judge the lot.

The company also invites employees to hear visiting artists lecture, encourages staff members to volunteer for work at area museums by publishing a directory of sites, and features the employees' and features the employees' own artwork--and that of employees' children who stay at the company's on-site child care center--in special shows.

The flip side of the art program's mission is to support art in J&J's home community. While several of the firm's 1,500 paintings, prints photographs, and sculptures are by such familiar names as Alexander Calder, Roy Lichtenstein, Henry Moore, and George Segal, J&J has purchased about 40 percent from area artists. The company also opens its facilities for art groups to use for seminars and recently sponsored a touring art exhibit to two area colleges.

One of the program's most active community alliances is with the Jane Voorhees Zimmerli Art Museum at nearby Rutgers University, which regularly loans artwork to J&J for exhibit. And the firm got in on the early stages of a subscription program--the Rutgers Archives for Printmaking Studios Portfolio--an innovative way for a company, or an individual, to collect good art by using the expertise of a Rutgers art authority. The subscription is a good investment, says Bzdak: "Some of the pieces we purchased initially have already tripled in value."

What does all this artistic camaraderie with employees and the community buy J&J? More than a beautiful workplace. "You can see the collecting art isn't our primary goal," Bzdak concedes. "We're convinced that art helps us reach other business goals--in public relations, community relations, and employee relations. We truly believe that art has the potential to influence our employees and customers, not only by making our workplace visually stimulating but by promoting the idea that we're responsive and responsible."