SoulPatrol (left) and Paula Saunders (right) performing at Juneteenth Performance. Photo: Jordan Durkee, 2025.
It hardly seems possible, but eight years have passed since Kemper Museum of Contemporary Art closed its Kemper at the Crossroads location.
In the meantime (except for a short pause during the pandemic), the museum has continued to mount what it calls “bold, inclusive and contemporary” exhibitions in the strikingly modern space on Warwick Boulevard that opened in 1994.
With middle age approaching, Missouri’s first contemporary art museum recently unveiled a new strategic plan and some key additions to its leadership team. Executive Director Jessica May and Chief Curator Jessica Hong both arrived in 2024. They’ve since been joined by William Gautreaux as board chair and Erica McGeachy Crenshaw as vice chair. Mary Kemper Wolf has been named Lifetime Chair Emerita.
And Jennifer Wampler, who’s led several major funding drives for local arts institutions, joined the staff as chief development officer in June.
“This is an exciting moment for the museum to deliver more impact, both regionally and nationally,” Gautreaux says.
The strategic plan emerged from a yearlong process. It centers around four pillars — programming, public engagement, philanthropy, and governance and management.
The first reaffirms the Kemper’s commitment to showcasing a broad spectrum of voices and championing great artists at different stages of their careers. It also mandates building “an innovative curatorial culture.”
Jessica May points to the current exhibition, “Andrea Carlson: Shimmer on Horizons,” as a perfect fit for that description.
“She’s an artist who is emerging on the national stage,” May says. “Her paintings and sculptures put environmental care and Indigenous land rights front and center. So we were able to connect with the scholarly community at Haskell Indian Nations University to develop a series of talks and conversations about the connections between art and land conservation.”
The second pillar, public engagement, calls for expanding the museum’s “reach and relevance” by building strategic partnerships and crafting ways to improve the audience experience.
It also commits to doubling the museum’s attendance in just five years.
May doesn’t blink. “We know it is ambitious but very achievable,” she maintains. “We are on track to increase our attendance by just over 15% in the first year of the plan.”
“One of the great things about our museum is that it’s free and it is intimately scaled. Some people love that — they want to slip in, enjoy the galleries for a few minutes and get on with their day. Other people might want to be welcomed, offered an orientation. We are going to work to meet both needs equally.”
May adds that the The Arterie, a proposed “connector” which would eventually link different Midtown/Plaza art destinations, is the kind of “indoor-outdoor” experience that excites her.
The other two pillars — philanthropy and governance — focus on modernizing the practices used in each, increasing board involvement, staff training and building a “culture of entrepreneurship, accountability and inclusivity at all levels” of the organization.
Though there may not be a specific pillar for it, May says the in-house cafe now known as Oil and Linen is “an absolute beacon for people” and one that’s bound to play a significant role going forward.
“The partnership with (chef) Ted Habiger and his team has been an amazing opportunity. We are seeing visitors who come to the museum for many different reasons. As many people come for a coffee and stay for the art as the other way around. We are here for that!”
