Polk Museum of Art Announces Citizens Bank & Trust Mayfaire by-the-Lake 2020 Poster Artist

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Lakeland, FL (February 20, 2020) - The Polk Museum of Art at Florida Southern College has announced the featured poster artist for Citizens Bank & Trust Mayfaire-by-the-Lake 2020.  

Barbara Rush’s acrylic pet portraits surprise and delight viewers with their geometric designs and vibrant colors. Rush’s swan portrait, Infused with Grace, will be the featured image for the 49th annual fine art show.

With Rush attending Mayfaire for the first time last year, she was delighted to have been recognized for her work. “It was quite exciting to be selected from hundreds of artists,” states Rush.

After being asked to be the Mayfaire poster artist, Rush wanted to create something that showed not only her skills and style as an artist, but that also represented Lakeland as a city. Infused with Grace is a tribute to the swans of Lakeland that surround Lake Morton, where Mayfaire by-the-Lake is held each year.

“When you visit, you will see the swans in beautiful black, white, and grey. I used the three colors of the swans and added the beautiful teal, lavender, purple, and grey blues, setting it on a lovely lake-like background,” explained Rush.

Rush’s work will represent the Polk Museum of Art and Mayfaire by-the-Lake 2020, printed on Mayfaire T-shirts, posters, and other materials used to promote the event, which attracts more than 70,000 people to the shores of Lake Morton annually.

“We are excited to have Rush as our poster artist for Mayfaire 2020,” said Dr. Alex Rich, Executive Director and Chief Curator of the Museum. “Her image exemplifies the spirit of our premier annual event, with the trademark swans that have come to be symbols of Lake Morton.”

The Polk Museum of Art is also excited to announce that Jayne Wilkinson, editor-in-chief of Canadian Art, the most read art magazine in Canada, will serve as judge for 2020 Mayfaire.

Citizens Bank & Trust Mayfaire by-the-Lake is presented on Mother’s Day weekend each year by the Polk Museum of Art. This year’s event runs May 9-10, 9 a.m. to 4 p.m. and is free to attend. For more information, visit the event’s website: https://www.mayfairebythelake.org.

The Polk Museum of Art Presents Music & Dance in Painting of the Dutch Golden Age

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LAKELAND (January 21, 2020) – The Polk Museum of Art at Florida Southern College presents its unique “Music & Dance in Painting of the Dutch Golden Age” exhibition from Saturday, February 8 to May 31, 2020. Admission to this exhibition is free and will be available for viewing in the Museum’s Dorothy Jenkin's Gallery and Gallery II on the first floor.

The Museum’s second collaboration with the Hoogsteder Museum Foundation, located in The Hague, following the popular “Rembrandt’s Academy” in 2017, this exhibition rivals any show the Polk Museum has previously hosted. “Music & Dance” features 27 Old Master paintings rarely seen before by the public. Framed around the interdisciplinary themes of music and dance, the exhibition has been designed to engage audiences of diverse interests and to integrate the fine and performing arts. The exhibition will also immerse visitors into the culture, attire, instruments, and dance styles of the so-called “Golden Age,” from the viola de gamba and the cittern to the "egg dance.”

“The exhibition delves deeply into the art, history, and culture of the Netherlands in the 17th century, a period of great wealth and cultural achievement for the Dutch people,’” stated Executive Director and Chief Curator Dr. Alex Rich. “Visitors will have the opportunity to see for themselves how brilliantly the Old Masters were able to capture the spirit of the Golden Age in their paintings, revealing in vivid color the insatiable Dutch appetite for singing songs, forming ensembles, and moving to melodies."

This rare opportunity to bring these privately-held European paintings from three centuries ago to Polk County goes to the heart of the Polk Museum's mission as an educational institution.

“We strive always to create experiences for our visitors that are unlike any they might find elsewhere,” Dr. Rich explained, “Not only does this exhibition hold a little something in it that should interest everyone, with its Old Masters and themes of music and dance, but it also presents masterworks that our audiences will never get to see again.”

Polk Museum of Art Opens Unique Global Art of the 1970's Exhibition

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LAKELAND (October 29, 2019) – The Polk Museum of Art at Florida Southern College is pleased to announce the opening of its unique Global Art of the 1970s: From the SC Johnson Collection exhibition on Saturday, November 9. Admission to the show is free and it will be on view in the Museum’s Dorothy Jenkins Gallery until February 2, 2020.   

This exclusive exhibition features works selected from the private collection of the SC Johnson Company, most of which have not traveled previously outside of the company’s international conference center, The Council House, in Racine, Wisconsin. Throughout the 1970s, Karen Johnson Boyd, daughter of H. F. Johnson, Jr., and company curator Lee Nordness traveled the world, researching the latest examples of global contemporary art and visiting the forty-five countries whose art would be represented in the collection. Together, Lee and Nordness sought to shape a diverse body of work that echoed The Council’s international mission and that would give visitors to it a glimpse at the most cutting-edge art of the time from around the globe.    

“We are honored to have had the opportunity to work with the SC Johnson Company to select pieces from this extraordinary collection and curate them thematically around global art of the 1970s,” noted Dr. Alex Rich, executive director and chief curator of the Museum. “This exclusive Polk Museum of Art original show will offer audiences a deep dive into rarely seen art from one of the most consequential decades in art history.”

The principal goal in selecting the artwork was to reach broadly across all media, cultures, and continents to demonstrate the breadth of Western and non-Western approaches to contemporary art. Thus, a piece on rice paper by Korean artist Young-Woo Kwon shares gallery space with a woodblock/serigraph work by Puerto Rican artist Antonio Martorell and an Op-Art painting by British art-world star Bridget Riley.

Importantly, many artists represented in and selected for the show are not the most recognizable art-world names. Instead, striving to foster a more inclusive approach to art history, it is the Museum’s intentional inclusion of works by under-represented artists from around the world that promises to introduce audiences to significant — but overlooked — artists, engaging visitors in the unique cross-cultural and cross-continental experiences of the dynamic 1970s.    

Polk Museum of Art Opens “Spirits” African and Oceanic Art Exhibition

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LAKELAND, FL– Spirits: Ritual and Ceremonial African and Oceanic Art from the Dr. Alan and Linda Rich Collection exhibition opens at the Polk Museum of Art at Florida Southern College on October 26, 2019. This free admission show will be on view in the Museum’s Gallery II through January 26, 2020.

Over the course of four decades, Dr. Alan and Linda Rich have displayed a passion for helping others, traveling the world and bringing medical care to those in need. With his profession as an ophthalmologist and eye surgeon and hers as an occupational therapist trained to help Alan in clinics and in surgeries, the Riches worked together to transform the lives of many in need of critical eye care.

While working in clinics in Papua New Guinea and throughout Africa, the Riches also immersed themselves in the diverse artistic cultures of the countries they visited.  Along the way, they acquired a collection of ritual and ceremonial objects that fill their home today. In this Polk Museum original exhibition, curated by executive director Dr. H. Alexander Rich (no relation) in close collaboration with the Riches, these artifacts, most of which speak to the close spiritual communion between humans and animals, will be displayed publicly for the first time.

Dr. Alan Rich acquired the first artifact in the collection in the 1960s, before he met Linda. Since then, the collection has grown in number and variety of pieces as the couple sought to gain a better understanding of the cultures and peoples they were visiting and treating. When they first started acquiring works together, the Riches received many of the pieces as gifts from grateful patients or from bartering directly with artisans in local marketplaces.

“African and Oceanic artists rarely create art just for art’s sake – their art is intimately connected to rituals and ceremony,” noted Linda. “Our art collecting was certainly secondary to the eye mission itself, but each object chosen for this exhibition has a special meaning to us in terms of how we acquired it and its spiritual purpose.”

Highlighted pieces within the show include 11 elaborately crafted masks from all over West Africa, five wooden Chiwaras (antelope-style headdresses worn for agricultural dances and rituals) from Mali’s Bambara people, and a large relief of village life scenes from Mozambique. In conjunction with this unique multicultural exhibition, a series of adult programs and events are scheduled.

For more details about the exhibition, program schedule, and Museum hours/location, contact Taylor Holycross at 863-688-7743 ext. 249 or tholycross@polkmuseumofart.org.

Polk Museum of Art at Florida Southern College Offers Summer Intern Gallery Talks

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Lakeland, Florida – The Polk Museum of Art at Florida Southern College will offer special student-led gallery talks this summer through the college’s budding Museum Studies program.

The affiliation between Florida Southern College and the Polk Museum of Art allows the college to build upon its Art History program by adding a Museum Studies program, which is set to launch this fall.

The new Department of Art History and Museum Studies, led by the Museum’s Executive Director & Chief Curator Dr. H. Alexander Rich and housed in the Museum, will typically offer four to six courses a semester. Students will experience a close-up look at what museum work entails. They will have the added benefit of being exposed to works of art in person rather than via projected images in a traditional classroom setting alone.

“The premise for the program is first and foremost to expose students to works of art and, beyond that, to permit students to glimpse firsthand future applications of their classroom learning in the career opportunities they see around them at the Museum,” said Dr. Rich.

Along with the new department, FSC students can apply for a competitive six-week summer internship program that will work in tandem with the Museum Studies program. Open to all undergraduate students at the college, no matter their major, summer interns are given the unique opportunity to work across a range of disciplines, such as art history, education, or marketing and learn the inner workings of the Museum.

One highlight of the summer internship program — now in its second year — is the gallery talks the interns offer the public. Interns will enhance their research and speaking skills by presenting on a specialized subject related to the Museum’s current exhibitions.

“Members of the community in attendance will gain fresh perspectives on our summer exhibitions and experience a unique set of programs that speak deeply to the life of the Museum as an educational institution,” Dr. Rich said.

Both the summer internship program and the new Department of Art History and Museum Studies aim to utilize the Museum as an educational resource and provide a link between the public community and FSC students.

The summer intern gallery talks will be held on Wednesday, June 26, 2019 from 2:00 – 3:00 pm and Wednesday, July 3, 2019 from 2:00 – 3:30 pm.  

 

Dr. Alex Rich to Head Polk Museum of Art at Florida Southern College

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LAKELAND (May 22, 2019) – The Polk Museum of Art at Florida Southern College has appointed Dr. H. Alexander Rich to be the Executive Director and Chief Curator for the Polk Museum of Art at Florida Southern College in Lakeland. Dr. Rich joined Florida Southern in August 2014 as assistant professor of art history, heading the art history program and directing the galleries and exhibitions. In June 2017, he assumed the additional role of curator and director of galleries and exhibitions for the Polk Museum of Art, as part of an affiliation agreement between the two organizations.

“It’s a great honor to be given the opportunity to lead a distinguished community and academic art museum,” Dr. Rich said. “The Polk Museum of Art at Florida Southern College has long been a core contributor to the life and culture of Lakeland and Central Florida. Since its affiliation with Florida Southern, the Museum has begun to make new and important contributions as an academic museum, promoting diverse areas of scholarship and broader community education and outreach, among other initiatives.”

Dr. Rich looks forward to “continuing to enhance the Museum's offerings and maintaining its integral relationship with the broader Lakeland community,” and building upon the strong legacy of excellence established by Claire Orologas, who has announced her retirement.

Dr. Rich earned his A.B. degree in English and Art History from Dartmouth College, and both his M.A. and Ph.D. in Art History from The Institute of Fine Arts at New York University. His museum experience began with a high school apprenticeship as a tour guide at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, followed by internships at the Whitney Museum of American Art and the Met, membership in the Exhibitions Committee at the Hood Museum of Art, and a research/writing fellowship in the Sackler Center for Feminist Art at the Brooklyn Museum of Art. He also worked as assistant to the Head of Museum Interpretation in the Education Department of the Whitney Museum, and as an adjunct professor at Hunter College, City University of New York, and the Fashion Institute of Technology.

“Dr. Rich has been a transformative leader as he has helped to guide the affiliation between Florida Southern College and the Polk Museum of Art,” said Museum Board Chair Lynda Buck. “He has worked to strengthen the Museum’s vital role in the local arts community while expertly directing its added mission of becoming a superior academic museum, bringing in world-class exhibitions that benefit the public and students alike.”

Founded in 1966 as the Imperial Youth Museum and renamed the Polk Public Museum in 1969 to better reflect its emphasis on art, history, and science, Lakeland’s premiere not-for-profit art museum doubled its exhibition and classroom facilities with the purchase of a vacant Publix Super Market building in 1970. Together with the School Board of Polk County, staff members worked to establish and sustain a curriculum-based art education program. The institution received accreditation from the American Association of Museums in 1983, and was renamed the Polk Museum of Art. Its current facility on Palmetto Street was formally dedicated in September 1988.

Claire Orologas, executive director and chief curator of the Polk Museum of Art since 2012, will become Executive Director Emerita. She ably led the Museum to national prominence. Ms. Orologas plans to continue a life-long role as an ambassador for the Museum and give presentations on various art topics. She will be relocating to a new home in Micanopy, Florida. In addition, Ms. Pal Powell will continue as Deputy Director. Ms. Powell has been in a leadership position at the Museum for more than twenty-seven years and is highly regarded.

Contact: Rebecca Paul-Martin
863-680-4735
rpaul@flsouthern.edu