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April 12 -  June 8, 2008
Opening Reception, Friday April 11, 4-7pm.
At the Foot of the Rockies: The Colorado Artists
The Albrecht-Kemper will once again borrow selections from the Moffett Family Collection, this time focusing on artists from the Colorado area.

Images of the West: Catlin/Curtis/Shafer
     The Albrecht-Kemper Museum of Art brings out selections from its collection of George Catlin’s Native American portfolio, Edward Curtis photographs, and Gus Shafer’s bronzes to comprise this exhibition celebrating Native American and Western life.
     George Catlin's North American Indian Portfolio contains twenty-five hand-colored lithographs depicting portraits and activities of several Great Plains Indian tribes. Catlin (1796-1872) was the first white artist to travel among and record the customs of native peoples. The portfolio is a rich history of the dress, ceremony, and life of both the people and the time they lived.
     Edward Curtis (1868-1954), a self-taught photographer and ethnographer, recorded in words and pictures the living traditions of American Indian tribes. His monumental, 20-volume encyclopedic work,  The North American Indian (1907-30), contains informative text, portraits, landscapes, and scenes of everyday life that continue to inspire and exert influence on American culture. The Albrecht-Kemper collection includes photogravure reprints from the portfolios that accompanied the encyclopedia volumes. The viewer will note that it is typical in Curtis' portraits for the subject to be presented in a tightly cropped view and with a shallow depth of field that blurs the surroundings, concentrating attention on the individual's face.
     Gus Shafer's bronzes typically depict the lives of Native Americans, Cowboys, and Ranchers. He was born in 1907 near Hoisington, Kansas. In 1930 he and his wife moved to Kansas City, where he worked for nearly 40 years as a commercial artist. At the age of 59, he sculpted his first model for a bronze casting. Falling in love with the process, he closed his commercial art studio within the next two years to concentrate on sculpting full-time. He was able to achieve international acclaim for his bronzes before he passed away in 1985.

 

LOOKING FORWARD:
(Please note dates may change)

June 14 - September 7, 2008
Opening Reception Friday, June 13, 2008, 5-8pm
Philomene Bennett and Lou Marak: A Tribute
These two artists have made an impact on the Kansas City art scene for many years. Philomene has taught for many years, and many of her students have gone on to become successful artists. Together, Philomene and Lou were instrumental in the creating of the Kansas City Artists Coalition and have been great advocates for the arts in Kansas City.
David and Theresa Harris
Theresa Harris creates intricate mixed media sculptures and teaches at MWSU.
David Harris creates delicate and stunning ceramics that are technical masterpieces.

September 13 -  November 9, 2008
Opening Reception Friday, September 12, 2008, 4-7pm
Robert Sudlow and his Students
Photography by Judith Sabatini
 

RECENT EXHIBITIONS:

January 19 - April 6, 2008
Opening Reception Friday, January 18, 2008, 4-7pm
Still Lifes from the AKMA Collection
With over 2400 objects, the Albrecht-Kemper must keep many artworks in long-term storage. For this exhibition, we have pulled together many of our drawings, paintings, and prints from the museum's permanent collection. We hope to broaden the viewer's concept of the still life as subject matter for the artist. Be sure to visit these artworks that you may have never seen before!
The Little White Lies of Johnny Naugahyde
Located in the Esson Tower Gallery, this small - but very special - exhibition of Kansas City artist Johnny Naugahyde will delight and surprise visitors.

February 24 - April 6, 2008
Opening Sunday, February 24, 2008, 1-4pm. Awards Presentation at 2pm.
Regional High School Art Exhibition
 The mission of the Albrecht-Kemper Museum of Art is to bring the excitement of American visual arts to the region through education, temporary exhibitions, the permanent collection, and the nurturing of regional artists. What better way to nurture young local talent than through exposure in a museum-sponsored juried art competition? The Regional High School Art Exhibition is an invitational exhibition, with over 75 schools from Northwest Missouri and Northeast Kansas asked to participate.
     Artworks are divided into nine categories based on media and/or technique. After a panel jury selection, First, Second, and Third Place, plus Honorable Mentions, are awarded in each category. Make sure you don't miss this opportunity to see the incredible and innovative work of our future artists.
     For more information, or If your school is interested in participating in this annual exhibition, please contact Jennifer Zeller, Curator of Education, at jzeller@albrecht-kemper.org or 816-233-7003.
Official Rules and Entry Form
2008 Participating Students
2008 Participating Schools and Teachers
2008 Award Winners

January 19 - February 17, 2008
Opening Friday, January 18, 2008, 4-7pm. Awards Presentation at 6pm.
Annual Membership Exhibition
The Membership Exhibition showcases the talents of museum members. It is open to current members of the Museum. Each member may submit two original works not previously exhibited at the museum. Artworks are divided into seven categories. The exhibition is then judged and awards presented in each category.
Official Rules and Entry Form
2008 Award Winners

November 17 - January 13
Opening Reception Friday, November 16, 2007, 4-7pm
Jim Cantrell: A Painter’s Odyssey
   Jim Cantrell paints primarily with oils and watercolors. He describes his technique as abstracted realism. His forte is the human figure encompassing masterful composition, & technique.
   Henry Adams, Professor of Art at Case Western Reserve University and biographer of Thomas Hart Benton, describes him as “an artist who transforms raw tubes of paint into designs and images, filled with pattern, meaning, illusion, and pictorial depth. His nuances of color, texture, or shape take on a fascinating life of their own, similar to, and yet recognizably separate from, the world of actual things.”
   A native of Oklahoma and raised in eastern Nebraska, Cantrell earned his Bachelor of Fine Arts degree from the University of Nebraska at Lincoln in 1958 and his Master of Arts degree from the University of Northern Colorado in Greeley in 1965 with a double emphasis in ceramics & painting. He began his distinguished career as a teacher. In 1971 he established himself as an independent studio artist in Bardstown, Kentucky where he continues to work.
Richard Brown Lethem: The Compass of Desire
   Artist’s Statement: People are my starting point. Characters in a landscape of the mind dictated by their relatedness, their community, loving or otherwise. I try to look hard and with some degree of humor, at what we fear and desire most: intimacy, alienation and our violent streak, the real stuff of our lives.
   My work is content driven. I feel a compelling inner narrative which responds to the individual in the context of social change, paradox, exuberance and vulnerability. Increasingly I am concerned with our shared environment with animals.
   Formally it is expressing movement and energy in transition. The state of change. With intensified color and a dancing line against shape and pattern I hope to record a free equivalence to the movement that defines the spirit.
   I see the defining social issues of my generation to be racism and a pervasive acceptance of violence. The Civil Rights Movement of the 50’s and 60’s and the Vietnam War brought both these issues into clear focus. Since then these issues remain just as relevant. In my work the subconscious mind has played a major role but consciously it has been expanding dialog with these two issues.
   Since moving to Maine in 1994 I have been heavily involved in teaching at the University of Southern Maine, particularly the discipline of drawing. The act of drawing defines my ideas and is inseparable from the process of my painting.
   The commitment to teaching along with my own painting have been urgent, important and ongoing in recent years. The human figure interacting with the environment and animals of the northern social landscape has been my dominant theme. I have also produced a body of work related to recent travel in Egypt and Mexico.

September 14 - November 3, 2007
Vincent Campanella: Classical Abstractionist
   Vincent Campanella (1915-2001) was born in New York City and began his life as an artistic prodigy, encouraged by his family in classic art school training. In the 1930s, as an artist with the Depression Era WPA, he moved to Wyoming and there, surrounded by wide-open vistas, his style began to evolve. Returning to New York, Vincent became affiliated with the Rehn Gallery, and then in 1949, moved west again, this time to Kansas City, for a teaching position at the Art Institute, and later at nearby Park University where he stayed until his retirement.
   Through the 1950s Campanella was a rising star in the world of art, alongside Milton Avery, Marsden Hartley, and Karl Knauths, whose method of painting also came from a close study of nature. But taste shifted away from naturalistic painting to the Abstract Expressionism of Jackson Pollock, Franz Kline, and Willem DeKoonig, and Vincent became disenchanted with the American art scene of the period. This exhibition takes a re-look at the art of Vincent Campanella and his place in the development of art in mid-twentieth century America. 

The accompanying exhibition catalog with essays by art historians Henry Adams and Burton Dunbar is available for purchase in the Museum Shop. Call 816-233-7003, ext. 10 or email frontdesk@albrecht-kemper.org to order.

Additional Biographical Information on Vincent Campanella
Vincent Campanella Timeline
Exhibition Press Release
 

June 15 - September 9, 2007 MidAmerica Pastel Society: 2007 National Exhibition  The MidAmerica Pastel Society (MAPS) is pleased to host the 2007 National Juried Pastel Exhibition. MAPS was form in 1988 by a group of Kansas City pastel artists who wanted to network, educate and to promote community interest in pastel. This exhibition draws together the nation's best pastel artists working today. The exhibition is both juried for acceptance, and then judged for awards.

2007 Show Organizer Bev Amundson

June 15 - September 9, 2007 Lisa Lala: Victory over Gravity       Lisa Lala has been immersed in art since birth since both her parents, Wil and Susan, are artists. Growing up in Manhattan, Kansas, Lisa now lives in Kansas City. Within the last year, she has mounted 3 sold out shows in Kansas City and has set the local art world abuzz with her successes. She has been featured in KC Magazine and The Kansas City Star.      Lisa studied at the University of Kansas where she received a Bachelor of Fine Arts degree. She subsequently studied abstract painting and creativity with Philomene Bennet in Kansas City and color with Wolf Kahn in New York.                 Her current work features abstract oil paintings on glass that were inspired by the sense of freedom one feels while riding a Ferris wheel. Lisa Lala Exhibition Statement Lisa Lala Brochure Article