Charles Crossley visits Laurel

Charles Crossley, a multimedia/collage artist from McComb, Miss., visited Laurel last week. He and LRMA museum education staff held one workshop for kids in the after-school program at the Townley Center and one at the Alternative School.

Walt Grayson at LRMA

On Thursday, February 16, Walt Grayson of "Mississippi Roads" fame spoke at LRMA to a large and appreciative crowd. We have "Art Talks" the third Thursday of most months and lately we find ourselves moving them to our largest gallery, the American Gallery. Art Talks are free, open to the public, and we provide drinks and snacks. Click on the link to the museum website for info on upcoming speakers.

Review of the Whitney Biennial

Have the Curators of This Year’s Whitney Biennial Finally Figured Out How to Make the Show Matter? -- New York Magazine

This year's biennial at the Whitney Museum of American Art in New York City opens next week. The venerable biennial has been in parts controversial, tedious, trendy, vilified, praised, and critiqued in every possible way. New York Magazine's Mark Stevens does a good job of tackling the meaning and method of the Biennial in general, and this year's in particular.

Good news from New Orleans

NOMA | New Orleans Museum of Art

After seven months, many layoffs (and some rehirings) and all the other devastation of Katrina, NOMA is reopening on March 3, 2006. This, to me, is a sign that New Orleans will rebuild, will survive, and that people there mean that the city will return to being the cultural mecca it has always been. Life without art is unthinkable; if the city is to survive, its music and art and literature must be nourished as well.

Chihuly's lawsuit situation

The Stranger | Seattle | Features | Feature | Glass Houses

The link goes to a long and thoughtful article about the status of Chihuly vis-a-vis Chihuly, Inc., and the distinctions between artists, artisans, and so forth. Dale Chihuly doesn't blow glass, but has 150 employees that produce his work and manage the studio business (designers, PR, architects, packers, photographers, you name it). On the one hand, Rubens had the same kind of enterprise going, and nobody questions his role as the Artist. On the other hand, what is the status of Chihuly's senior glassblowers, whose artistry and skill infuse Chihuly's designs with life? What happens when one of his glassblowers goes to another company and starts making things that look "Chihuly-ish"? This is the contention of the lawsuit - that the rogue glassblower is knocking off Chihuly - but then again, glass blowers have been knocking off Chihuly for twenty years or more. It's an interesting read from Chihuly's hometown newspaper.

Andrew Crawford

Andrew Crawford is one of our favorite emerging artists, and he's got family ties to Laurel: his dad grew up here. Andrew's a sculptor in Atlanta, working in metal. We've got one of his sculptures in the LRMA collection, Fiddlehead , which evokes both the violin (fiddle) and the organic curve of the fiddlehead fern. He's got a show coming up at the Georgia Museum of Art, and the last time I ran into him, he was opening a show at the Mobile Museum of Art. Click here for more info: Andrew Crawford: Sculpture

Art with Hearts

On Valentine's Day, Mandy and Mark with the assistance of Wes held holiday art classes. Here are a few pics of the classes and the artwork.The kids decorated cookies and t-shirts, and made custom valentine cards to take home.

Another museum blog: Eye Level

Eye Level

Updated no more than once a week or so, but always worth a visit, is the blog of the Smithsonian American Art Museum in Washington, DC. SAAM is in renovation, to reopen this summer, and they are ramping up their programs and online presence. My favorite recent post is the time-lapse video of the three days and many people it took to install one (very complex) artwork, James Hampton's The Throne of the Third Heaven of the Nations' Millenium General Assembly.

Lecture on the Biltmore today...

Today LRMA co-hosted a lecture by Betsy Baker of the Biltmore Estates. We may have more pics to post later, but herewith: visitors checking in at the museum lobby, and a gorgeous arrangement donated to the museum by the Laurel Garden Club.

Installing "Pinturas de Fe"

We are installing the new exhibition, "Pinturas de Fe: The Retablo Tradition in Mexico and New Mexico," this week. If I say so myself, the show is looking good. We thought it might be interesting to see a few shots of the installation process. Directly above is a photo of interns Katarina Dearman and Amber Lewis matching labels with retablos. Above and to the left: we have unpacked everything - retablos, photos, and text panels - and are ready to condition-report them. In a condition report, the registrar checks to be sure the items are in the same shape they were in when they were packed up. We'll do it again before we send them back.

and, bear with us: blogging is a new technology and I haven't quite figured out how to get the pictures to go where I want them.

Introducing: Live from LRMA

In which the staff of the Lauren Rogers Museum of Art keeps the public up-to-date with museum happenings. Classes, events, exhibitions, parties, you name it: we're here to talk about it.