Exhibits

The Heart Is a Fist

Contemporary Indigenous artwork – paintings, drawings, textiles, and sculptures – by current and former students at Haskell Indian Nations University highlights a special Library exhibition in conjunction with Big Read 2022.

The collection is curated by David Titterington, an adjunct professor of art at Haskell.

Big Read 2022 revolves around the first Native American to serve as U.S. poet laureate, Joy Harjo, and her acclaimed book An American Sunrise. The nearly two-month initiative is a celebration of poetry and reading, as well as Native American literature and culture.

The Heart Is a Fist remains on display in the Central Library’s first-floor Genevieve Guldner Gallery through May 29, 2022.

Related Event

The Heart Is a Fist: Artists Roundtable Discussion
Wednesday, May 25, 2022 | 6 p.m.
Central Library, 14 W. 10th St.

Details

The Heart Is a Fist promo with photograph by artist Dominique Brown titled Two Women, of two Native American women in colorful textiles seated in nature.

Opens:

Sat, April 2, 2022

Closes:

Sun, May 29, 2022

Central Library

Evicted

For too many in Kansas City and across the country, the challenge of keeping up with the rising costs of food, fuel, and other consumables is only the beginning. They’re at risk of losing the roof over their heads. More than 10,000 tenants have been hit with eviction filings in Kansas City the past two years – with many more forced to move in actions outside the courts.

Their harrowing experiences are illuminated in this immersive traveling exhibition through photographs, video storytelling, and spatial elements. A pallet of household goods typifies the personal effects removed from a home during eviction and piled ignominiously on the lawn or side of the street. Four different living spaces are discombobulated – walls not extending floor to ceiling, wallpaper and outlets on the outside rather than the inside – suggesting the disruptive impact of eviction or even its prospect.

Infographics spell out the scope of what many see as a growing social scourge.

The exhibition, produced by the National Building Museum in Washington, D.C., is inspired by Matthew Desmond’s Pulitzer Prize-winning book Evicted: Poverty and Profit in the American City. Too expansive for either of the Central Library’s two formal galleries, the exhibition sprawls across the first-floor grand foyer, Kirk Hall.

Opens:

Sat, May 7, 2022

Closes:

Sun, July 17, 2022

Central Library

Making History: Kansas City and the Rise of Gay Rights – an Exhibit and a Response

With the rise of an LGBTQ civil rights movement following World War II, milestones of achievement inevitably brought societal, cultural, and political backlash – oppression ranging from castration to institutionalization, employment discrimination, and censorship of LGBTQ history.

Amid renewed threats to LGBTQ rights today, the exhibition Making History: Kansas City and the Rise of Gay Rights – an Exhibit and a Response recounts historical challenges in Kansas City and across the country and examines the tools and approaches used to overcome them. Those precedents lend guidance and hope for the future.

The multifaceted display incorporates a 12-panel exhibition, Making History: Kansas City and the Rise of Gay Rights, produced by students in the University of Missouri-Kansas City’s public history program. It explores the pivotal role of LGBTQ activists – many in Kansas City – prior to the 1969 Stonewall Riots in New York City. The exhibition drew nationwide attention last fall with its removal, after multiple complaints, from the Missouri state capitol in Jefferson City.
The new Library exhibition also features artwork by students in a printmaking course, The (Printed) Queer Archive, at the Kansas City Art Institute. Curated by Ruben Castillo, a visiting assistant professor of printmaking at KCAI, the works point to the future with a critical eye on dominant cultural narratives.

The original Making History exhibition was curated by Christopher D. Cantwell, an assistant professor of public history and an affiliate of the religious studies program at the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee; Stuart Hinds, the curator of special collections and archives at UMKC; and Kathryn B. Carpenter, a Princeton University doctoral candidate in the history of science who holds a master’s in history from UMKC.

Opens:

Sat, June 4, 2022

Closes:

Sun, August 21, 2022

Central Library

‘The Nine’ and Other Works: The Art of Desiree Kelly

Black baseball players once made up a fifth of MLB rosters. That number has dwindled to fewer than 8%. What has changed? Or, what hasn’t changed and might be keeping Black players away from the sport? In the summer of 2021, artist Desiree Kelly joined reporters from The Washington Post in examining the experiences of nine African American baseball players to learn more.

Kelly is a Detroit-based artist known for celebrity portraits that blend a street art style with traditional oil techniques. See her collection The Nine -- portraits of Willie Mays, Jim “Mudcat” Grant, Vida Blue, Bo Jackson, Ken Griffey Jr, CC Sabathia, Bruce Maxwell, Tim Anderson, and Ian Moller -- in the Central Library’s Guldner Gallery through August 28. To her original depictions of male players, ranging from Hall of Famers to an 18-year-old prospect, Kelly has added portraits of two of the first female players in the Negro Leagues, Mami “Peanut” Johnson and Toni Stone.

Opens:

Sat, June 18, 2022

Closes:

Sun, August 28, 2022

Central Library

‘Nearest by Air to Everywhere’: A Tour of Kansas City’s Aviation History

Kansas City’s aviation history dates to the mid-19^th century and a scene right out of Oz – the first ascension of a manned hot air balloon in the city, witnessed by thousands of people spilled onto rooftops and other high vantage points. It extends from biplanes to bombers, from dusty airfields to modern airports, from flying schools to the successful pursuit of a hometown airline, TWA.

As the latest chapter unfolds – and construction of a new $1.5 billion, single-terminal iteration of Kansas City International Airport moves toward completion in March 2023 – this new exhibit celebrates that rich heritage, charting the arc of air travel in the city and surrounding area. Kansas City had previously been a hub of transportation by water, by overland trail (the Santa Fe) and by rail. By air, too, it became (and billed itself) “Nearest by Air to Everywhere.”

The exhibit draws heavily from vintage photos and other images in the Library’s Missouri Valley Special Collections, and from the Kansas City Museum, the Jackson County and Overland Park historical societies and other cultural partners.