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Treasures of the Dead: Burial Art of Ancient China

Published October 26, 2016 works of art 2 Comments
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Today’s post comes from Mo Gyeong Seong, a DMA Teen Advisory Council member with a serious passion for history. He currently attends Carroll Senior High School in Southlake, Texas, where he has taken several classes in world history, humanities, and global languages. Enjoy his bite-sized tour of Chinese burial sculpture from the DMA’s permanent collection!

China’s Tang Dynasty was marked as a time of prosperity and discovery that fostered a distinctive cultural sphere lasting down to the modern day. Religion and spirituality played an important part in Tang life, and great thought was put into what would happen after an individual’s last breath. With Halloween fast approaching, I wanted to share a bite-sized tour of some of the burial art made by the Tang Dynasty.

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Pair of Lokapalas (Heavenly Guardians), early 8th century C.E., Dallas Museum of Art, The Eugene and Margaret McDermott Art Fund, Inc., in honor of Ellen and Harry S. Parker III

The Lokapala are guardians of the world in Buddhism, introduced to Tang China by the preceding Sui Dynasty. According to legend, the Lokapala were originally protector gods in Ancient India, called the Four Great Heavenly Kings. After witnessing the enlightenment of the Buddha, they chose to lead an army of ghosts to defend the worshippers of the Buddha from demons. The Four Kings would slowly integrate into Chinese burial traditions, guarding the four cardinal directions. Their fierce faces reflect their foreign origins. However, their armor is of a mystical Chinese style and a feng huang–an East Asian mythological King of Birds and symbol of harmony and royalty–is sculpted into their helmets.

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Polo horse tomb figure, 618-906, Dallas Museum of Art, gift of Mr. and Mrs. Arthur Rothwell.

Some of the finest pieces from Chinese tombs are the handsome and muscular ceramic horses created by talented craftsmen for burials of the elite. This one has faded over time, but centuries ago it would have dazzled in reds and oranges. Horses, thought to be related to dragons and crucial to the countless military campaigns waged by China, symbolized strength, wealth, and power. Horses also represented a spiritual ascension, as the souls of the dead could ride them into the afterlife.

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Tomb Plaque Marker on a Tortoise Base, 1000-1200, Dallas Museum of Art, the Cecil and Ida Green Acquisition Fund

After the fall of the Tang Dynasty, a new burial tradition was adopted by the nobility: the use of large stone stele, or bei in Chinese. These stele were often etched with information from the deceased’s life, including occupation, age and date of death, birthplace, and their life accomplishments, as an enduring honor to the deceased. The stele is capped by carvings of mythological animals and erected on the back of a stone tortoise, an animal who could carry heavy loads according to Chinese mythology.

Make sure you visit these works of art currently on view on Level 3 of the permanent collection galleries! What other burial traditions can you uncover at the Museum?

Mo Gyeong Seong
Teen Advisory Council Member

A Fairly Good Time

Published October 18, 2016 Just for Fun , works of art Closed
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A view of the Esplanade at Fair Park from Jessica Thompson, Manager of Teen Programs.

Last Tuesday was our sixth annual Education Fair Day, a chance to escape the chill of the Museum for some deep-fried fun in the sun at the State Fair of Texas. For some, like Jessica Thompson, going to the Fair is a time-honored tradition. Jessica’s paid a visit to Big Tex nearly every year of her life. For others, like our McDermott Interns, it was a super-sized introduction to a slice of Texas history and culture.

Emily Wiskera and I tackled the trip together. While we chowed down on Fletcher’s corny dogs (a must!), admired the blue ribbons in the creative arts building, and searched for our favorite haunted house ride, I started wondering about what connections could be made between the fair and the DMA. A set of photographs recently installed in the Center for Creative Connections certainly provides some fair feels, but what about elsewhere in the Museum?

State and World’s Fairs

Official 2016 State Fair of Texas poster, image from http://bigtex.com/2016theme/
Hemisfair, San Antonio, 1968, Robert Indiana, Dallas Museum of Art, gift of Tucker Willis, © Morgan Art Foundation Ltd. / Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York

The above pair of posters was an easy connection to make. On the left, we have the 2016 State Fair of Texas poster; on the right, the DMA’s poster from the 1968 World’s Fair in San Antonio. Each was designed around a unique concept. Hemisfair, San Antonio illustrates the overarching idea of people coming from all over the globe for the World’s Fair. The artist, Robert Indiana, used circles with arrows drawn in towards a star in the south of Texas to convey this message. The star, besides featuring prominently on the state flag of Texas, acts a giant X-marks-the-spot, where the Hemisfair and San Antonio are the treasure.

Immediately recognizable in the State Fair of Texas poster is our celebrity cowboy, Big Tex, surrounded by fields, livestock, and farming equipment. The design is graphic, straight forward, and conveniently explained by a page from the State Fair of Texas website:

Originally established as a livestock exposition back in 1886, it is without question that the Fair has deep roots in agriculture. In honor of its history, the Fair constantly strives to promote agricultural education and aims to further support this initiative through its 2016 event, themed “Celebrating Texas Agriculture.”

Though on different scales, state fairs and world’s fairs both bring people together for a variety of cultural experiences. Here’s how the State Fair of Texas compares to world’s fairs:

  • The State Fair of Texas, at 24 days per season, is the longest running state fair in the United States. A World’s Fair can last up to six months–the 1968 Hemisfair in San Antonio did!
  • An estimated 1.5 million – 3 million people attend the State Fair of Texas each year. For reference, the population of Dallas is 1.3 million people, and Texas’ population is 27.47 million people. The 1968 Hemisfair brought in 6.4 million people from all over the world, and the recent 2015 Expo (or World’s Fair) in Milan had 20 million visitors.
  • This year marks the 130th anniversary of the State Fair of Texas in Dallas. In contrast, world’s fairs are held in a new city and country every year.

Creative Arts

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Baltimore, Maryland, “Album” quilt, c. 1861, Martha E. Keech, Dallas Museum of Art, anonymous centennial gift

The Baltimore album quilt above, despite being 155 years old, isn’t too different from a quilt you might find on a visit to the creative arts building. This kind of quilt, with its trademark white background and squares (or blocks) with floral designs in red and green, first became popular in… you guessed it: Baltimore! The style remains popular today. This particular album quilt was made by hand by one woman, Martha E. Keech. Sometimes groups of women would join forces to make one of these quilts and each would sew one block and sign their name, hence: an album quilt.

The more than 25 categories for quilts at the State Fair this year include sections for ones made by individuals, pairs, and groups, both by hand and by machine. Overall, there are over 1,100 categories in the creative arts competitions! Many people are familiar with submissions like pies, quilts, and collectibles, but did you know the Fair also has LEGO assembly categories for kids and adults, as well as a “Glue a Shoe” contest? This year’s Glue a Shoe contest features such entries as “Grumpy Flat,” after everyone’s favorite internet cat, and “Hamilton: An American Shoesical.”

Fantastic Foods

Maize and Windmill, 1937, Otis Dozier, Dallas Museum of Art, The Barrett Collection, Dallas, Texas, ©Denni Davis Washburn, William Robert Miegel Jr, and Elizabeth Marie Miegel

No Fair day is complete without sampling some of the sensational snacks! Here are some numbers from Eater Dallas on a fair-goer favorite, Fletcher’s corny dogs:

  • On average, 630,000 corny dogs are sold each 24-day State Fair of Texas run.
  • Fletcher’s is in its 74th year of selling corny dogs at the Fair.
  • To satisfy corndog purists, 1,500 gallons of mustard are needed each year.
  • To satisfy heathens like myself (see selfie above), only 800 gallons of ketchup are required.

Yes, corn (sometimes called maize) is a key ingredient in the batter used for corny dogs, but it’s more than a family resemblance that ties together this State Fair staple and Otis Dozier’s Maize and Windmill. Dozier, a native Texan, was a member of a circle of artists called the Dallas Nine. He regularly submitted works of art to the State Fair of Texas’s creative arts competitions – and he often won. According to a DMA docent, Maize and Windmill is one such blue ribbon winner!

A bonus connection: Dozier’s upbringing on a Mesquite farm instilled in him a lifelong love of agriculture which can be found in his many paintings of farms, fields, flora, and fauna. This ties in pretty neatly with this year’s Celebrating Texas Agriculture theme, don’t you think?

The Fair closes this Sunday, October 23, but these three works of art will still be here to greet you on your next visit, up on Level 4. What other fairly relevant connections can you find? You know that something has to relate to the butter sculpture!

Jennifer Sheppard
Teaching Specialist

Communication Across the Ages

Published September 27, 2016 works of art 2 Comments
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This week, the Center for Creative Connections installed an array of communication devices dating from 1909 to 1972. These objects demonstrate the dramatic change communication has undergone over the past century: devices have decreased in size to become more portable, while our ability to communicate with each other has become more immediate. 

 

Before texts and tweets, messages were sent and received by post or telegraph. Imagine sitting at a desk in the early 1900s and using these beautifully designed, handcrafted tools. Perhaps you are opening an envelope or dipping your pen in an inkwell to compose a letter to a dear friend. “Snail mail” would have been the only way to correspond with your out-of-town friends and family. According to the U.S. Postal Service, from 1926 to 2001, the number of items mailed steadily increased from 15 million to 103 million. However, this number had decreased to 62 billion by 2015. Today, instead of waiting days to send and receive a letter, we can simply send a quick text or email that arrives in mere seconds.

 

One of the first cameras to be marketed to women, the Kodak Petite was produced from 1929-1933. It was sold in a handful of colors and its small lightweight design made it easily portable. Today, anyone with a smartphone has access to camera at all times. It’s interesting to note that when the Kodak Petite is closed, it is roughly the size of a modern day smartphone.

 

Until the birth of radio and television in the 1920s, information, news, and entertainment were dispersed to the masses through printed materials like newspapers. This 1930’s Bluebird is a small personal radio, similar in color and design to the larger Nocturne radio in the Museum’s collection. Though this elegant radio may have been outside the budget of most living through The Great Depression, the medium itself remained an important aspect of everyday life in the early 20th century. The way we listen to music has certainly changed today. Instead of waiting for our favorite song to come on the radio, we have access to podcasts and programs like Spotify, which make listening to shows and songs possible practically anytime.

 

The Ericofon was the 1950s version of an all-in-one device. This one-piece phone combined the once separate dialing component with the listening/speaking component. At the time, it’s thirteen ounce weight was a huge improvement on the typical five or six pound telephone.

 

Reminiscent of an astronaut’s helmet, the JVC Videosphere’s spherical design came on the heels of the first moon landing–doubly significant because the landing was televised. The Videosphere was one of the first televisions meant to function as “a second set” for a household. Its small size also indicates that it was designed for use by an individual rather than a group.

Perhaps what is most striking about all of these devices is that each of these modes of communication is readily available today in one small, handheld device. Stop by the Center for Creative Connections to see these works of art in person and consider how communication has changed in your lifetime. 

 

Artworks shown:

  • Gustav Stickley, Desk set, c. 1909, Dallas Museum of Art, gift of Beth Cathers and Robert Kaplan
  • Walter Dorwin Teague, “Kodak petite” camera, designed c. 1927, Dallas Museum of Art, gift of David T. Owsley
  • Walter Dorwin Teague, Bluebird radio (Model 566), designed c. 1934, Dallas Museum of Art, bequest of Sonny Burt, Dallas
  • “Ericofon” pattern telephone, Telefonaktiebolaget L M Ericsson, designed 1949–1954, Dallas Museum of Art, 20th-Century Design Fund
  • “JVC Videosphere” television, Victor Company of Japan, designed 1972, Dallas Museum of Art, 20th-Century Design Fund

Jessica Fuentes
Manager of Gallery Interpretation and the Center for Creative Connections

On your mark, get set, Go van Gogh!

Published August 5, 2016 Art & Teaching , works of art 2 Comments
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The Rio Olympics may just be getting started, but some of us here at the DMA have been going for the gold all summer long. Former Graduate McDermott Intern for Gallery and Community Teaching, Whitney Sirois, wrote this year’s Go van Gogh summer outreach program,”Go for Gold: Art and the Olympic Games.” The program brings together DMA artworks that celebrate everything we love about the games (gleaming prizes for the victorious!, scenes of athletes in action!, an array of incredible uniforms!), and it has definitely gotten us in the Olympic spirit.

We trained for this moment by looking closely at artworks from Ancient Greece. We crowned ourselves victors with golden pipe cleaner wreaths. We tried a toga on for size. We even got our wiggles out in Olympic fashion–stretching and doing some jumping-jacks, just like athletes! (And then we decided it was a good thing that Olympians don’t wear togas anymore–they make jumping-jacks tricky!).

getting a closer look
toga time!
stretching like athletes

The DMA’s Mixed Doubles painting inspired our art projects. We had to look very closely to determine which Olympic sport artist George L. K. Morris painted. Can you find the athlete’s arms and legs, and their sports equipment in the painting below? Using only triangles of construction paper and black markers, we then created our own similarly abstracted collages of a favorite sport. Many of our abstracted masterpieces were about the very Olympic sports we’ll be watching over the next few weeks.

George L. K. Morris, Mixed Doubles, 1948, American, Dallas Museum of Art, gift of David T. Owsley via the Alvin and Lucy Owsley and Alconda-Owsley Foundations
sporty arms
Hampton-Illinois library

Now it’s your turn to look closely at some artworks! Can you pair the Go for Gold collages below to the matching Rio sport pictograms for equestrian, soccer (football, in Olympic-speak!), and archery? What other sports do you see?

swimming

Amy Copeland
Manager of Go van Gogh and Community Teaching Programs

DIY Coil Basket Weaving

Published March 22, 2016 Creativity , DIY Tutorial , works of art Closed
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Each month, we offer a variety of activities at the large tables in the Center for Creative Connections gallery. Each activity is related to a nearby work of art. One of my favorite new activities is coil basket weaving, inspired by the storage basket, bowl, and burden basket created by weavers from the San Carlos Apache tribe.

Storage Basket, Apache peoples, c. 1880, Dallas Museum of Art, gift of Lillian Butler Davey.
Bowl, Apache peoples, c. 1880, Dallas Museum of Art, gift of Lillian Butler Davey.
Burden Basket, Apache peoples, c. 1880, Dallas Museum of Art, gift of Lillian Butler Davey.

The actual materials used to create these baskets–devil’s claw, willow, cottonwood, and buckskin–are natural resources found in the Arizona region where the tribe resides. To make the materials more pliable, they are often soaked in water prior to weaving. The patterns are created by alternating dark and light.

Basket weaver Lizette Phillips is in the process of weaving a coiled basket. Notice the raw materials nearby. Photograph by Robert H. Peebles, 1954.
The slender horns of the devil’s claw pod (right) produce the black designs in this Papago basket. Copyright W. P. Armstrong

IMG_2431In the gallery, we use three colors of raffia ribbon to create our coil baskets. Red is easily distinguishable, so these strands create the basket core which will be covered during the weaving process. Then tan and black raffia are used to wrap the core and create patterns.

Once you have your materials in hand, here are the steps to guide you through the process:

 

For your basket core, cut the red raffia into ten 24 inch long strands.

For your basket core, cut the red raffia into ten 24 inch long strands.

Choose a tan or black strand of raffia and wrap it tightly around the red basket core strands.

Choose a tan or black strand of raffia and wrap it tightly around the red basket core strands.

Cover about two inches of the red basket core, then begin spiral the wrapped end inward

Cover about two inches of the red basket core, then begin to spiral the wrapped end inward.

Continue spiraling so that the wrapped strands resemble a snail shell.

Continue spiraling so that the wrapped strands resemble a snail shell.

Take the end of your tan or black raffia strand and loop it through the spiral to secure the basket center.

Take the end of your tan or black raffia strand and loop it through the spiral to secure the basket center.

Continue to wrap the red basket core.

Continue to wrap the red basket core.

Each time you cover a few inches of the red basket core, thread your tan or black raffia through the most recent coil to keep the coils connected.

Each time you cover a few inches of the red basket core, thread your tan or black raffia through the most recent coil to keep the coils connected.

If you want to switch colors, cut a strand of the alternate color.

If you want to switch colors, cut a strand of the alternate color.

Line your new strand up as if it was part of the red basket core.

Line your new strand up as if it was part of the red basket core.

Secure the new strand by wrapping it a few times with the old color strand.

Secure the new strand by wrapping it a few times with the old color strand.

Let the old color strand become part of the red basket core, and use the new color strand to wrap around the basket core.

Let the old color strand become part of the red basket core, and use the new color strand to wrap around the basket core.

Continue wrapping the basket core, securing the newly wrapped coil to the previous coils every few inches.

Continue wrapping the basket core, securing the newly wrapped coil to the previous coils every few inches.

Once you get the coil weaving technique down, think about experimenting with other materials. The Apache weavers used devil’s claw, willow, cottonwood, and buckskin because they were plentiful resources. What kinds of resources do you have at your disposal to weave?

Jessica Fuentes
C3 Gallery Manager

 

 

Adventures in Plating ala Pollock

Published March 20, 2016 Just for Fun , works of art Closed
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Stained, poured, spattered, seeped, imprinted, feathered, and the oh-so-famous: dripped. Artworks in the DMA’s Jackson Pollock: Blind Spots radiate action verbs that describe both how Pollock made his art and how the art continued to transform once the paint/ink hit the canvas/paper. Spending the last few months surrounded by these works and their many verbs, I decided to take some of Pollock’s verbs into my kitchen to see where inspiration took me. And in a very big stroke of luck, I heard about and tracked down a local Dallas chef who had done the same thing!

First task on my adventure: source black “paint.” While I’m big on “eating my colors,” brainstorming black foods turned out to be tricky (how many can you name without Google?!). Trips to a few grocery stores provided some diverse and exotic options:

black lentils

Second task: put black “paint” to “canvas.” Black paint absorbed into Pollock’s unprimed canvas leaving halos and burred edges around the solid poured lines in works like Number 26, 1951, shown in detail below. Fresh mozzarella turned out to be a perfect responsive canvas, and a thick, syrup-y reduction of balsamic vinegar and a little black strap molasses became the black(-ish) paint that stained and soaked into the cheese in big thick dollops. This also turned out to be a pretty tasty painting.

And much like Pollock, I got really into it, and had a bit of collateral damage as I worked…

balsamic reduction + phone!

Next, taking inspiration from Pollock’s works on paper, I rounded up some thin paper-like phyllo dough, which I left layered in sheets, and painted with a sweet coffee and black fig sauce. The sauce stained and puckered the phyllo, much like Pollock’s ink stained Japanese paper. I didn’t actually eat this one as it’s shown, but the sauce tasted good on ice cream!

And now, saving the best for last….While I had lots of fun playing around in the kitchen, going for more of a visual approximation than a dish you would whip up for dinner, I was excited to see how someone who cooks for a living would use Pollock’s art as inspiration. My chef friend Charlotte connected me with local chef Jordan Criss, of Deep Ellum’s Twenty-Seven, who had come to the Museum to see the exhibition and walked away with some great ideas (thank you, Charlotte!).

Below is Chef Criss’s West Bank Pho, a creation made from crispy fried garlic, cilantro, tasso ham, Sriracha, and Hoisin sauce, and beneath the tastiness, his inspiration for plating the dish:

West Bank pho

West Bank pho

The show inspired my dish by shattering my idea of contrived plating. All Of Pollock’s work is a kind of calming chaos that isn’t taught and rarely seen in culinary arts.  His work pushed the limits and I feel it’s hard not to want to do the same after walking through his exhibition.

Has an artwork or exhibition ever inspired you to head into the kitchen to play with (or plate) your food? Share in our comments, and then, check out our Education staff’s collection-inspired cookies, including a masterfully Pollock-ed cookie!

Amy Copeland
Manager of Go van Gogh and Community Teaching Programs

Green Tara at the DMA

Published October 7, 2015 People , works of art 1 Comment
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As the new Manager of Docent and Teacher Programs, my first few weeks at the DMA have flown by in a busy, joyous blur. Everyday seems filled to the brim as I acclimate to my new role and learn as much as I can from my new colleagues and our fabulous docent team. In the midst of this whirlwind of activity, I find myself coming back to the Asian Art collections again and again to visit a familiar face— Green Tara, a beloved female Bodhisattva central to Tibetan Buddhism.

Green Tara, Tibet, 18th century, Gilt copper alloy and turquoise, Dallas Museum of Art, the Cecil and Ida Green Acquisition Fund

Green Tara, Tibet, 18th century, Gilt copper alloy and turquoise, Dallas Museum of Art, the Cecil and Ida Green Acquisition Fund

In the summer of 2008, I had the opportunity to study Buddhist philosophy and Tibetan history and culture at the College for Higher Tibetan Studies in Himachal Pradesh, India through Miami University’s Anthropology Department. Each morning before breakfast, my fellow students and I would wipe the sleep from our eyes and make our way to temple to practice meditation with our teacher, Geshe Kalsang Damdul la, a monk and scholar with an advanced degree in Tibetan Buddhism. Geshe la taught us the value of cultivating resilience and mindfulness through meditation. I can still picture him chuckling and asking us, “What good is being a genius if you don’t know how to live a quality life? I appeal to you, practice!”

The College for Higher Tibetan Studies in Himachal Pradesh, India.
A sweet welcome message from our hosts, the monks and nuns who study at the College for Higher Tibetan Studies.
Incense perfuming the air during morning prayers.
A lot of hungry monks lined up for their afternoon daal.

As we embarked on our practice, Geshe la instructed us that one possibility was to direct our meditation towards a deity. He suggested Green Tara, a much-loved female Bodhisattva distinguished by her emerald green skin, maternal compassion, and constant readiness to protect her devotees from physical and mental misfortune.

On our last day, one of my monk friends pressed a printed Green Tara card into my hand and told me, via a translator, that I should keep her with me always for protection. She has been with me ever since, tucked safely in my wallet.

Prayer flags decorating sacred sites in the Himalayan foothills.
Spinning prayer wheels at the Dalai Lama’s temple complex in Dharamsala, Himachal Pradesh, India.

The DMA’s exquisite 18th century Green Tara sits on her lotus throne with her right leg extended, ever-ready to leap to the aide of the suffering. Her hand gestures, or mudras, symbolize protection and boon granting. Shining gilt copper alloy flecked with cool turquoise stand in for the Bodhisattva’s characteristic emerald skin. What I love most about Green Tara is the delicate suggestion of tension in her lithe figure—she’s at once in a state of perfect calm and ready to spring into action.

Visiting Green Tara brings me back to the stillness of those early mornings spent in meditation, and reminds me of the sense of ease and wellbeing we experienced chanting the Bodhisattvas’s mantra together with Geshe la. Om Tare Tuttare Ture Svaha.

Lindsay O’Connor
Manager of Docent and Teacher Programs

Friday Photos: Back to Nature

Published September 25, 2015 Friday Photos , works of art Closed
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With the summer heat subsiding, it’s time to get back to nature and truly enjoy the scenery. Get out this fall and capture some beautiful Texas landscapes, then submit your photographs of the great outdoors to our Flickr Group DMA Back to Nature to have your images displayed at the Center for Creative Connections #DMAdigitalspot.

 

Need some inspiration? Take a look at these Texas-centric works of art from our collection:

William Henry Huddle, Study for the “Surrender of Santa Anna,” c. 1885, Dallas Museum of Art, The Karl and Esther Hoblitzelle Collection, gift of the Hoblitzelle Foundation
Julian Onderdonk, Untitled (Field of Bluebonnets), 1918-1920, Dallas Museum of Art, bequest of Margaret M. Ferris
David Bates, Catfish Moon, 1986, Dallas Museum of Art, The Barrett Collection, Dallas, Texas
Otis Dozier, Cactus and Crow,1947, Dallas Museum of Art, Ted Dealey Prize, Eighteenth Annual Dallas Allied Arts Exhibition, 1947
Erwin E. Smith; Frank Smith, Watering His Horse, Cross-B Ranch, Crosby County, Texas; c. 1909; Dallas Museum of Art, Dallas Art Association Purchase

Click here for more information on how to submit your images to the #DMAdigitalspot.

Jessica Fuentes
C3 Gallery Manager

Open Looks in the Paint, All Day (and Late Night)

Published September 17, 2015 works of art 2 Comments
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DMA’s got game. And that game is basketball.

This Late Night, we’re teaming up with the Dallas Mavericks to put a sports-themed spin on our regular Late Night programming. And in a nod to both our encyclopedic collection and the Mavs always-international team roster, the evening will also have a global focus. One of the many activities featured tomorrow is our new ‘Round the World self-guided tour.

Self-guided tours are bite-sized: they focus on four to five artworks each, packaging our wonderfully expansive collection into short, themed looking adventures. Self-guides include facts about artworks you can’t find on gallery labels. They provide artwork images and gallery locations, getting you to the right space in the Museum, but letting you wander just enough that you get that fun I-just-found-something-on-a-scavenger-hunt sort of feeling when you find yourself right in front of the artwork. Self-guides are cheeky and fun, and in the case of ‘Round the World, chock-full of sometimes veiled and other times blatant Mavs/basketball references that some of us here (ahem!) are pretty jazzed about.

So if you’d like to see an artwork that’s nothin’ but net, explore a small exhibition devoted to the DMA’s Big German (he’s a 16th century print-maker), or see two objects that could fit in courtside at a Mavs game, pick up our ‘Round the World self-guided tour at the Visitor Services Desk tomorrow night.

And if you can’t make it to Late Night, ‘Round the World and our many bite-sized tours of the collection can be found in downloadable pdf versions on our website.

Amy Copeland
Manager of Go van Gogh and Community Teaching Programs & MFFL

Friday Photos: Summer Progress

Published August 28, 2015 Creativity , Friday Photos , works of art 1 Comment
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Luis Alfonso Jimenez Jr., Progress Suite, 1979, Dallas Museum of Art, General Acquisitions Fund, © Luis Jimenez / Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York

This summer, visitors to the Center for Creative Connections have participated in a communal drawing activity called Community at LARGE. Individual visitors enlarged one small portion of Progress Suite by Luis Jimenez and added their drawing to a large gridded wall, so that collectively they have created an enlarged reproduction of the original lithograph. Initially, it was exciting to watch as the blank wall slowly filled up with drawings and the image became recognizable. But now that each square has been drawn, the fun part has been watching as the drawing changes from day-to-day with the addition of new visitor contributions.

Here are a few short flipagrams of the evolution of my favorite squares.

 

 

 

Stop by the Center for Creative Connections during your next visit to the Dallas Museum of Art to make your own contribution to our communal drawing. Look for more photos of this project on Instagram and Twitter with #DMAlivingdrawing.

Jessica Fuentes
C3 Gallery Manager

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