New Summer Exhibitions to Open May 30 at UW Art Museum

Five new summer exhibitions will open Saturday, May 30, at the University of Wyoming Art Museum.

“Miniature: Small Contemporary Works” revisits the history of small work through a variety of contemporary approaches. Artists have worked in the small-scale genre of miniature art for centuries, dating back to the 15th-century illuminated manuscripts of the Far East and Europe.

Miniature art is characterized by highly skilled and painstaking techniques that draw the viewers deeper into the work for close inspection. Artists in this international exhibition include Eric Tillinghast and Lynne Cibanoff (United States), Marie Hartnett (United Kingdom), Gregory Halili (Philippines), Lucy Mackenzie (Sudan), and Cybele Young and Matthew Schofield (Canada).

“Gods, Goddesses and Kings: 17th-19th Century Persian and Indian Miniature Paintings” presents one of the best-known forms of Persian and Indian painting. The small size, intricate and delicate brushwork, and vibrant colors impart Persian and Indian miniature paintings with a unique identity. Known for bright and pure colors, the paintings were created with mineral-based pigments that remain vivid despite the passage of time.

“The Modern West: The American Landscape after the Frontier” presents examples of American artists whose cultural response to modernization existed beyond the skyscrapers of the city and, at the same time, broke from traditional modes of landscape painting. American Modernism is usually thought of as limited to New York City in the decades following the turn of the 20th century. The towering skyscrapers and heavy machinery dominated iconography of modernization and industrialization. Yet, some artists, in their search for an authentic American art, moved west, distancing themselves from the urban life that was quickly becoming the emblem of national identity. These artists chose to reinvestigate the American landscape on their own terms, through the aesthetic qualities of the land itself.

The UW Art Museum continually adds artwork to its collection through donations and purchases. “New Acquisitions: The Art Museum Collection” highlights some important recent acquisitions to the collection. On view for the first time, these works represent the museum’s ongoing mission to create a comprehensive and significant collection for teaching, research and exhibition. 

All acquisitions, whether donations or purchases, are carefully considered based on existing areas of strength and relevance, and within the context of supporting UW’s academic and cultural missions. As a result, the UW Art Museum is able to add significant artworks that vary from American Indian artists John Nieto and “Woody” Crumbo, important woman artists Judy Chicago and Leslie Dill, and the use of unique mediums by Brandon Ballengée and Amié Mpane.

“Blackfeet Indian Tipis: Design and Legend” is a portfolio of 26 tipis, of which a selection is on view, that were observed at one time or another of the encampments of the Blackfeet or Blood Reserves during 1944-45 when the annual Sun Dance was in early July. In producing the silkscreen plates for this collection, efforts were made to show the tipis as they were in the mid-1940s when the original data was collected. 

Painted tipis were an important traditional art form among most American Indian Plains tribes. But with the destruction of the great buffalo herds in the latter part of the 19th century, and the change from buffalo cowhide tipis to canvas tipis, the tradition died out, except among the Blackfeet. This new exhibition is available for travel across the state through the Art Museum’s Regional Touring Exhibition Service.

An opening reception will be held at the UW Art Museum Thursday, June 11, from 6-8 p.m. to celebrate the new summer exhibitions, and is the opening reception for the conference, “Our Place in the West and Beyond: Wyoming at 125.” This event is free and open to the public.

For more information, call the Art Museum at (307) 766-6622, visit the website at www.uwyo.edu/artmuseum, or follow the museum on Facebook and Instagram.

Through its “Museum as Classroom” approach, the UW Art Museum places art at the center of learning for all ages. Located in the Centennial Complex at 2111 Willett Drive in Laramie, the museum is open Mondays through Saturdays from 10 a.m.-5 p.m. Admission is free.