Exhibits
A car plows with terrifying force through a crowd of protesters in Charlottesville, Virginia. The 15-year-old survivor of a forced Boko Haram suicide bombing mission poses in Nigeria, discreetly shrouding her face with flowers. Hitterite children in Manitoba play tag atop a stack of massive straw bales.
They’re among 50 arresting images featured in the 75th annual Pictures of the Year International exhibition celebrating the work of the world’s leading photojournalists. Administered by the Reynolds Journalism Institute at the University of Missouri’s Missouri School of Journalism, it focuses on pivotal events of the past year and ranges from spot news to feature photos.
Co-presented by Pictures of the Year International and the Kansas City/Mid-America chapter of the American Society of Media Photographers.
A rising tide of urban rioting in the Vietnam era finally engulfed Kansas City on April 9, 1968. For four days following the funeral of Martin Luther King Jr., the city’s predominately African-American East Side joined nearly 300 other U.S. cities in the ’60s in seeing long-simmering racial unrest erupt into violence on the streets. The toll here was high: six dead, at least 78 confirmed injured, and close to $4 million in damages and other losses.
A special Library exhibit, It Finally Happened Here, looks back at that tumultuous episode in the city’s history and the effectiveness of efforts – up to today – to address its causes.
The exhibit, now on display at Southeast Branch, will move to different Library locations throughout the year. Images and research materials were drawn from the collections of the State Historical Society of Missouri-Kansas City Research Center, LaBudde Special Collections at the University of Missouri-Kansas City, The Kansas City Call, The Kansas City Star, and the Library’s Missouri Valley Special Collections. Southeast Missouri State University history professor Joel Rhodes led the research, with contributions from Derek Donovan of The Star, Rachel Forester of the SHSMO, Kelly McEniry of the LaBudde Special Collections, and Donna Stewart of The Call.
The project follows the March 26, 2018 program Strife in the Streets: Kansas City Remembers 1968, which the Library co-presented with KSHB-41 Action News and KCPT-Kansas City PBS.
Upcoming Schedule:
Bluford Branch - On display September 4 through September 23
North-East Branch - On display September 25 through October 14
Waldo Branch - On display October 16 through November 4
Westport Branch - On display November 27 through December 6
The new exhibit Noble Synthesis - located in our Genevieve Guldner Gallery - features a collection of the Tulsa resident's drawings, photographs, and crystallized creations, which marry his love of chemistry with his art. Thrasher practices a kind of alchemy, transforming and combining commonplace materials to render something brilliant. A dead cicada, or an animal skull, takes on a macabre beauty with the adornment of colorful crystals grown by the artist.
The enchanting works, curated by recent Kansas City Art Institute graduate E.K. Harrison, make up the latest in a yearlong series of Library exhibits curated by KCAI students. It is underwritten by the Richard J. Stern Foundation for the Arts and Pam and Gary Gradinger.
their craft, ushering in a new era of personal, longer-form stories touching on mortality, religion, sexuality, and other adult topics.
Eisner’s innovative storytelling, layouts, and art inspired a generation of cartoonists including Jules Feiffer and Mad magazine’s Al Jaffee.
His work is spotlighted in the traveling exhibit Will Eisner: The Centennial Celebration, a collection of 86 giclees (fine art digital lithographs) reproduced from his original artwork. It is on display in our Rocky and Gabriella Mountain Gallery.
Just a four-minute walk from Kansas City’s old First National Bank – now the home of the Central Library – some of the biggest names in American entertainment once made their way to a small photography studio and a man they trusted to cast them in just the right light.
From 1915 to 1930, Orval Hixon photographed hundreds of rising stars of vaudeville, stage, and early film. More than two dozen of them would be immortalized on the Hollywood Walk of Fame. Their images, as captured by Hixon, are featured in the Library’s latest exhibit of his work in the gallery named for Hixon on the lower level of the Central Library.
Co-presented by James R. and Joyce A. Finley, Charles David and Linda Hixon, and the Richard J. Stern Foundation for the Arts – Commerce Bank, Trustee.
Efforts in Kansas City to combat blight and “renew” the city through redevelopment took off after World War II. But visionary ideas came at the expense of established neighborhoods, architectural landmarks, and sense of community.
Featuring before-and-after photographs, maps, and other documents, this new exhibit examines the origin and implementation of urban renewal and its long-term, segregative effects on the city. Officials and developers tried to create a “city of tomorrow.” Their decisions remain a part of our lives today.
The exhibit, researched and curated by Michael Wells of the Library’s Missouri Valley Special Collections, is on display on the fifth floor of the Central Library.
