The act of discovery is the process of learning of the the existence of something for the first time. With Art & Artifacts, the goal is to create an awareness of the many museums and galleries within the metropolitan community. To spur discovery, this spot will be filled with items that museum goers need to find or gallery patrons may seek out. So often museums and galleries are crowded, but the hope it to offer specific knowledge on a handful of pieces.
Either way, KC Studio staff hopes to give readers a taste of the works found within the community.
Enjoy the discovery!
Princess Mary Christmas Box
found at the National World War I at
Liberty Memorial
100 W. 26th St., Kansas City, Mo.
In November 1914, England’s Princess Mary led the effort to provide “everyone who would be wearing the King’s uniform on Christmas Day 1914 with a gift from the nation.” The brass boxes contained cigarettes or a pipe and tobacco, pencils, stationary and a photograph of Princess Mary, the 17-year-old daughter of King George V. For women in service and soldiers from India, instead of tobacco, the boxes contained candy and other treats. A total of 2,504,677 Princess Mary boxes were made. The last ones were finally distributed by the spring of 1915. The lid of the Christmas box features a profile of the Princess along with the names of the major Allied nations at war that Christmas of 1914.
Hemisphere in Steel
by Arlie Regier
found at Leopold Gallery
324 W. 63rd St. Kansas City, Mo.
Leopold Gallery Fine Art Advisor and President Paul Dorrell says Arlie Regier, relatively unknown when they met in 1993, showed him one of his early Hemispheres. Each piece is fabricated from stainless steel elements he finds in scrap yards. “I was so blown away that I helped him get into a Santa Fe and San Francisco gallery, and his career took off. Then in about 2002 a curator for the Boston Museum of Fine Art saw a Hemisphere in the Santa Fe gallery, was impressed, and acquired it for their collection of contemporary craft. That was like joining the Majors. That whole process started in my first space downtown over a simple cup of coffee.”
Target
by Jasper Johns
found at Belger Arts Center
2100 Walnut St., Kansas City, Mo.
Among the artwork in the Belger Collection is Target, a lithograph from 1960. Target is the first print that Jasper Johns produced with Universal Limited Art Editions. Since 1960 Johns has done more than 100 prints with ULAE and set a new standard for printmaking in America. In the summer of 2012 the Belger Collection loaned more than 70 prints by Johns to the Phillips Gallery in Washington, D.C. These prints, and other works by artists in the Belger Collection, have also been loaned to galleries and museums in Arizona, New York, South Carolina, California and elsewhere in recent years. The Belger Foundation considers the artworks in the Belger Collection as ambassadors of Kansas City and has a very active loan program. In addition to the loan program, the Belger Arts Center has hosted more than 50 exhibitions since it opened at 2100 Walnut Street in Kansas City’s Crossroads Arts District in March of 2000.
Paper Plates are ceramic dishes
made by Red Star Studios resident
artist Ryan Fletcher. Created in
collaboration with Chef Howard Hannah of The Hotel Rieger Grill & Exchange, they were made to look like crumpled paper, playing on the idea of “paper plates” used for less formal occasions. Fletcher has been creating and exhibiting his functional, sculptural and decorative work at Red Star Studios during his two-year residency. He’s collaborated with local and national chefs hoping to inspire new dishes, presentations and experiences for chefs and patrons alike. Fletcher’s residency culminates with a solo exhibition at Red Star Studios in spring 2013.•
