The Board of Trustees of William King Museum has announced the appointment of Marcy K. Miller as the new Executive Director effective March 1.
read more...New children’s station .....
The education department has added a new component to Level 1 of the Museum, an ART SPOT! This area encourages children to make their own art similar in style to artwork viewed in the exhibitions they have seen. This fun activity will help participants relate to the exhibitions on view in the museum galleries. Bring your children, grandchildren, family and friends to see the exhibitions and visit the new ART SPOT!
Exhibitions:
Cohabitants: New Works by Heide Trepanier and David Mazure
March 19 through August 22, 2010
Opening reception: Thursday, March 18 from 6 to 8 pm free and open to the public
Heide Trepanier (Richmond, VA) received her MFA from Virginia Commonwealth University in 2000 and has since been included in countless national and international exhibitions. She recently received the Virginia Museum of Fine Art Professional Fellowship, 2009-2010.
David Mazure (Johnson City, TN) received his MFA from East Tennessee State University in 2008. His works and installations have been included in exhibitions nationwide, winning numerous awards. He is currently teaching at Appalachian State University, Boone, NC, and East Tennessee State University, Johnson City, TN.
An Educated Woman: Art from Girls' Schools and Women's Colleges
January 22 through July 11, 2010
“Should our daughters study art? Yes, and upon a larger scale than boys; they are to build up and beautify our homes,” wrote W. S. Neighbors, President of Sullins College in Bristol, Virginia, in the early 1910s. Neighbors’ emphasis upon the inclusion of art courses in the curriculum of women’s colleges was under scrutiny in the early twentieth century, but his ideas stemmed from traditions stretching hundreds of years into the past. Beginning as a signifier of the type of “accomplishment” received through private or academy education and continuing as a popular component of women’s collegiate art departments, the act of creating beautiful objects is enmeshed in the history of women’s education in Southwest Virginia and Northeast Tennessee.
The ornamental arts differ markedly from the art projects most students complete today. In the infancy of women’s education, the term typically encompassed painting and drawing and various forms of needlework. Now recognized as “schoolgirl art,” these pieces have come to symbolize a class and era in which a young woman’s suitability as a potential wife was determined by her ability to read, write, sketch, stitch, play a musical instrument, sing, and speak French. Girls acquired these skills initially through private tutors, then later at small academies. Gradually, more academic subjects took precedence over the ornamental arts, but they continued to be regarded as being so essential that they were retained as electives, even as communities founded small women’s colleges. As Neighbors makes plain, women were now expected to cultivate an appreciation for beauty in the domestic sphere. They continued to master painting and drawing, but they were also instructed in painting china, shaping wax flowers, carving wooden furniture, and painting tapestries, among other arts.
Linking sampler to school, An Educated Woman will highlight ornamental art projects and the history of the region’s many women’s educational institutions. It will also explore real women’s use of their artistic talents beyond fulfilling their expected duties as wife and mother.
Related Events
Members’ & Lenders’ Prevue
Friday, January 22, 2010, 6 to 8 pm
Gallery Talk with Curator Elyse D. Gerstenecker
Tuesday, March 2, 7 pm
“Girls’ Education and Samplers in Tennessee”
Lecture with Jennifer Core and Janet Hasson of the Tennessee Sampler Survey
Sunday, March 14, 2 pm
Girls only! See the exhibit and create your own
ornamental art project inspired by the show.
Tuesday, March 23, 7:30 pm
Please note: You must be a museum member or a lender to the exhibition to attend the Prevue. Non-members who would like to attend are invited to become museum members at the door that evening.
© 2009 William King Museum