Category Archives: Museum

Celebrate Diego Rivera Birthday by viewing Portrait of Two Women at Arkansas Arts Center

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File:Diego Rivera, 1914, Two Women (Dos Mujeres, portrait of Angelina Beloff and Maria Dolores Bastian ), oil on canvas, 197.5 x 161.3 cm, The Arkansas Arts Center, Little Rock, Arkansas.jpgOn December 8, 1886, Diego Rivera was born as Diego María de la Concepción Juan Nepomuceno Estanislao de la Rivera y Barrientos Acosta y Rodríguez.

One of his masterpieces is 1914’s Portrait of Two Women which is part of the permanent collection of the Arkansas Arts Center. The official name is Dos Mujeres.  It is a portrait of Angelina Beloff and Maria Dolores Bastian.

This oil on canvas stands six and a half feet tall and five and a half feet wide.

Influenced by cubists such as Picasso, Rivera adopted fracturing of form, use of multiple perspective points, and flattening of the picture plane.  Yet his take on this style of painting is distinctive.  He uses brighter colors and a larger scale than many early cubist pictures. Rivera also features highly textured surfaces executed in a variety of techniques.

The painting was a gift to the Arkansas Arts Center by Abby Rockefeller Mauzé, sister of Arkansas Governor Winthrop Rockefeller.

 

Enjoy the holidays and the “Say It Ain’t Say’s” Sweet Potato Pie contest at Mosaic Templars today

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MTCCSayJoin the Mosaic Templars Cultural Center for a festive and fun day full of holiday cheer! The fun runs from 2pm util 5pm.

This year’s event will feature the 4th annual “Say It Ain’t Say’s” sweet potato pie contest, in honor of Little Rock’s black Santa, Robert “Say” McIntosh.We’ll have live entertainment by the Gloryland Pastor’s Choir, the Lorenzo Smith Band Camp and the Horace Mann Middle School Dance Ensemble. Activities include a kids’ craft station and the opportunity to browse our current exhibits, “Freedom! Oh, Freedom!” and the 2015 Creativity Arkansas Collection.

Guests and a panel of celebrity judges will determine who has the best sweet potato pie in Central Arkansas. Celebrity judges include Power 92 FM’s Broadway Joe, food and travel writer Kat Robinson, AY magazine food columnist Pamela Smith, and Kelli Marks, owner of Sweet Love Bakery.

Enjoy refreshments provided by RSVP Catering.

This year, a trolley will be available to take guests to two other Department of Arkansas Heritage Museums located in downtown Little Rock: Old State House Museum and Historic Arkansas Museum. The trolley route will also include the Governor’s Mansion Open House.

For more information call 501-683-3620 or email Tameka@arkansasheritage.org.

Holiday Open House at the Old State House this afternoon

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oldstatehouseToday is the day for the Department of Arkansas Heritage museums in Little Rock to celebrate the holidays.

This afternoon from 1pm until 4:30pm, the Old State House Museum will be hosting a Holiday Open House.

The traditions of joyous family holiday celebrations past can be relived at Holiday Open House. Visitors will find the Old State House colorfully decorated for the season. Fun, hands-on activities will be available to children; they can create unique holiday cards and more.

Delightful carols will be performed by local music groups. Visitors will also enjoy delicious cookies and punch.

Call (501) 324-9685 for more information. Admission is free

The 48th Annual Christmas Frolic this afternoon at Historic Arkansas Museum

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HAM-frolicWhen the Culture Vulture was just a Culture Chick, his parents took him to then-Arkansas Territorial Restoration Christmas Open House.

Thankfully, this event continues and celebrates Christmas as it was in the 1800s with living history, carols, reenactments, live music, dancing and more. Visitors come from across the state every year for our famous hot cider and ginger cake, as well as Arkansas-made holiday shopping in the Museum Store.

Activities:

  • Have your photo taken with Father Christmas from 1:30 to 2pm and from 2:30 to 3 pm.
  • Crafts and cards in the Hands On History classroom
  • Live music performances in our atrium and galleries.
  • McVicar House: Readings of “The Night Before Christmas” (originally published in 1823) at 1:30, 2:15, 2:45 and 3:15 pm. Readings will alternate with appearances by Capt. James McVicar.
  • Print Shop: Learn what apprentices looked forward to about the holiday; make a wax seal
  • Brownlee Kitchen: caroling
  • Hinderliter Grog Shop: dancing
  • Farmstead: Blacksmith Shop open, Early Arkansas Reenactors will be doing a variety of pioneer demonstrations, cider and gingercake in the parlor, crafts in the bedroom, reindeer food on the porch.
  • There will be games on the historic grounds and at the farmstead.

The fun continues from 1pm until 4pm today.  Watch for HAM director Bill Worthen to dance the Virginia Reel, which members of his family have been dancing in Arkansas since the 1820s.

Tonight at Clinton Center, Patterson Hood delivers latest Kumpuris Distinguished Lecture

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Over the course of ten albums with the Drive-By Truckers, the band he co-founded, and three acclaimed solo records, songwriter Patterson Hood has developed a style that blends a heart-rending observation of Southern culture with a healthy respect for the power of myth in ways that have placed him firmly in the company of great American storytellers like Twain and Welty.

“As a songwriter, I’ve spent the better part of my career trying to capture both the Southern storytelling tradition and the details the tall tales left out, putting this dialectical narrative into the context of rock songs,” Hood says of a career that has seen him turn his hand to prose with success as well. Last July, Hood’s op-ed piece, “The South’s Heritage Is So Much More Than Just A Flag,” appeared in the New York Times Magazine, shortly after Hood published the lyrics to a new song inspired by the events in Ferguson, Missouri.

Tonight, Friday, December 4, Patterson Hood tells stories and sings songs about living in (and leaving) the South and his life in Rock and Roll and the Drive-By Truckers in the next installment of the Frank and Kula Kumpuris Distinguished Lecture Series, in partnership with the Clinton School of Public Service and AT&T.

When: Friday, December 4, 2015
Doors Open: 6:00 P.M., Address begins at 7:00 P.M.

Where: Clinton Presidential Center Great Hall 

130 years of Cromwell Firm focus of Old State House Museum Brown Bag lecture today

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OSH Brown BagJoin the Old State House Museum at noon on Thursday, December 3, for a Brown Bag Lunch Lecture led by Dan Fowler, Chief Operating Officer at Cromwell Architects Engineers, as he speaks about the influence and history of 130 years of Cromwell.
The talk is in support of the current temporary exhibit at the Old State House Museum, “Lost + Found.”
“Lost + Found” highlights eight different projects completed or renovated by Cromwell during its 130 year history. These include projects in Little Rock (Little Rock City Hall, the Federal Reserve Bank Building and 615 Main Street), North Little Rock (St Joseph’s Home for Children), Pine Bluff (the Temple Building and the Pines Hotel) and Hot Springs (the de Soto and Majestic Hotels). Many of these structures were designed by Charles L. Thompson, one of the founders of Cromwell and one of the most-known and prolific architects in Arkansas in the 20th century. “Lost + Found” ends December 11.
The talk is free and participants are encouraged to bring a lunch. Soft drinks and water are provided.

 

Today at noon – Bill Worthen discusses Historic Arkansas Museum for Butler Center Legacies & Lunch

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Bill-Worthen_K0A4687-webAt Legacies & Lunch, Bill Worthen, director of the Historic Arkansas Museum, will discuss the museum’s history, placing emphasis on Louise Loughborough, founder of the museum, and Ed Cromwell, who led the museum after Loughborough’s death.

Worthen, a Little Rock native, is a graduate of Hall High School and Washington University, St. Louis. After teaching high school in Pine Bluff for three years, Worthen became director of what was then known as the Arkansas Territorial Restoration in 1972. In 1981, the organization became the first history museum in Arkansas to be accredited by the American Association of Museums. The museum was renamed the Historic Arkansas Museum in 2001 to reflect its expanded facility and mission. Worthen’s current research interests are the bowie knife, sometimes called the Arkansas toothpick, and the Arkansas Traveler, in its many forms.

Legacies & Lunch is free, open to the public, and supported in part by the Arkansas Humanities Council. Programs are held from noon-1 p.m. on the first Wednesday of each month. Attendees are invited to bring a sack lunch; drinks and dessert are provided. For more information, contact 918-3033.