FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

March 6, 2017

Media contacts:

Lesa Griffith

Tel: 808-532-8712

Scott Whelden
Tel: 808-532-8719
Email: swhelden@honolulumuseum.org

SPRING PROGRAMS AT THE
HONOLULU MUSEUM OF ART


Museum offers slate of edifying free lectures, garden workshops at Spalding House, PechaKucha, and more

HONOLULU, HAWAI‘I—The Honolulu Museum of Art is ready to refresh people’s brains with its spring programs. Here’s what’s coming up.

FREE LECTURES + TALKS

Artist talk: Zhan Wang
Thursday, March 9 • 4 p.m. • Doris Duke Theatre • Free
People driving down Beretania Street are wondering what those two giant rocks are in front of the museum. They are an installation by Beijing-based artist Zhan Wang, as part of the Honolulu Biennial, taking place March 8 to May 8. As part of Biennial programming, the museum’s curator of Asian art Shawn Eichman moderates a talk with Zhan Wang about his art and practice.

Rewire and Revive: Conservation and the Work of Nam June Paik
Media conservator Jeff Martin
Saturday, March 11 • 10 a.m.–noon • Spalding House • Free with admission
RSVP required:
 Email spaldinghouse@honolulumuseum.org
Noted New York–based archivist and media-art conservator Jeff Martin comes to Honolulu to work on the museum’s Nam June Paik work WareZ Academy (1994), now on view in HoMA Select. Jeff will assess the work, meet with local technicians, and make restoration recommendations. Martin will talk about the history of WareZ Academy and the challenges conservators face when working on Paik’s video installations.

Artist talk: Shahzia Sikander
March 17 • 5 p.m. • Doris Duke Theatre • Free
As part of programming for her installation Parallax, on view March 16 to July 30, Pakistani-born and internationally recognized artist Shahzia Sikander talks about the meaning and making of her work. The artist’s pioneering practice takes Indo-Persian miniature painting as a point of departure and challenges the strict formal tropes of miniature painting as well as its medium-based restrictions by experimenting with scale and media. She is the recipient of a John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation “genius award” and her work has appeared in the Istanbul Biennial, the Fukuoka Asian Art Triennale, The Museum of Modern Art (MoMA), and the Venice Biennale, among many other venues.

Degas’s Escape: Affirming while Obliterating His Marks on Paper and Canvas
Timothy J. Standring, Gates Foundation Curator of Painting and Sculpture, Denver Art Museum
April 17 • 6 p.m. • Doris Duke Theatre • Free
Edgar Degas’s works defy categorization. Being neither a Realist nor an Impressionist, but a hybrid of sorts, he worked fearlessly, passionately, and determinedly in a vast array of media, from etchings and monotypes, to pastels and photography. Timothy Standring’s anecdote-filled talk—based on research undertaken in museums and libraries across Europe and North America—is the perfect introduction to this late 19th-century French artist. This year marks the centenary of Degas’s death, which is being celebrated with exhibitions worldwide.

Timothy J. Standring joined the Denver Art Museum in 1989, and since then has led a significant initiative to make art and art history accessible to a broader public and has served the museum in many capacities. He has curated more than 13 exhibitions at the museum and his many published articles reflect interests that include 17th-century Roman patrons, van Gogh’s drawings, and the works of Andrew and Jamie Wyeth.

Eye of the Sixties: Richard Bellamy and the Transformation of Modern Art
Judith Stein, authorMay 3 • 6 p.m. • Doris Duke Theatre • Free
Judith Stein, author of the evocative biography Eye of the Sixties: Richard Bellamy and the Transformation of Modern Art (Farrar, Straus & Girous) takes you back to the early sixties, to the beginning of the market for contemporary art in New York, when the art dealer and tastemaker Richard Hu Bellamy (1927-98) made history but chose not to make money. At the fabled Green Gallery on 57th Street, Bellamy launched the careers of today’s iconic Pop, Op and conceptual artists, mavericks and minimalists including Yayoi Kusama, Yoko Ono, Claes Oldenburg, James Rosenquist, Donald Judd, and Dan Flavin. In her talk, Stein brings alive a posterity-averse beatnik with a legendary eye, a tale that unfolds as postmodernism elbowed the past aside.
Local connection: Richard Bellamy’s aunt Rebecca, the sister of his mother Lydia Hu, lives in Honolulu, as does Rebecca’s daughter in law Susan Soong, who will be at the lecture.

SPRING IN THE SPALDING HOUSE GARDENThis weekend workshop series connects people Spalding House’s lush grounds, which is currently bursting with blooms.

‘Ohi Workshop: How to gather and arrange Hawai‘i’s flora
March 18 • 10-11:30am • $35 for members, $45 for non-members (optional $4 vase, other material included)
Registration required: Go to honolulumuseum.org/events
Participants will learn how to make beautiful arrangements using local greenery and flowers with Tamara Rigney and Mariko Reed, the authors of the hit book ‘Ohi: How to Gather and Arrange Hawai‘i’s Flora. Students will explore the museum gardens to forage and learn about plants ideal for arranging, then create two hand-tied arrangements using clippings from the garden and flowers from local farms.  

The Nature of Drawing
Saturday + Sunday, April 8 + 9 • 10 a.m.-4 p.m. • $100
Registration required: Go to honolulumuseum.org/learn/classes or call 532-8741
Express yourself through botanical and biological illustration. Instructor Sharon Birzer, a scientific illustrator who also teaches at the Frye Art Museum, will guide you in observing the form of botanical and biological subjects to document and interpret what you see. Also includes critique sessions. Graphite and watercolor will be covered. See Birzer’s work at sharonbirzer.com.

Medicinal Plant Walk + Infused Oil Making at Spalding House
May 27 • 9:30 a.m.-2 p.m. • $35 museum members, $45 non-members
Registration required:
Go to honolulumuseum.org/events
Learn how to identify plants and their beneficial properties in the Spalding House gardens with The Green House Hawaii teacher Andrew Gerren. Individuals will gain a better understanding about various plant uses and learn how to make an infused oil from plants they have just learned about to take home with them! Gerren is also founder and president of Garden to Gardens, Inc. and Sacred Herbs & Botanicals, and a wild food and medicinal plant forager and enthusiast.

The Green House Hawaii is an environmental education organization that showcases and models sustainable living in an urban setting.

ART SCHOOL SUMMER SEMESTER
From art history to poetry writing, kids’ art camps to grown-up life drawing studio, there is something for everyone at the Honolulu Museum of Art School. Summer registration starts April 11. Classes will be posted online at honolulumuseum.org/learn. Or people can call 532-8741 to request a course catalog.

MUSEUM SHOP ARTIST SPOTLIGHT: LISA KLAKULAK
April 1 • 11 a.m.-1 p.m. • Info: 532-8704
Visitors can meet and talk story with Lisa Klakulak, a North Carolina–based textile artist, in the Museum Shop on April 1 (for real—it’s not an April Fool’s joke). As Strongfelt, she gives felting workshops around the world. She makes everything from handbags to necklaces out of felt. Klakulak exhibits at national fine craft exhibitions and select galleries. Her body adornment, accessorites and figurative sculpture have been featured in Fiber Arts, Surface Design Journal, Fiber Art Now and American Craft.

ART + CHOREOGRAPHY: ENCOUNTER II
April 15 • 11am-noon • Free with museum admission

This event is part of programming for the exhibition Artists of Hawai‘i. In February, University of Hawai‘i–Manoa dance professor Peiling Kao brought her Dance Improvisation class to “tune” and explore the three installations that make up the exhibition. They perform their structured improvisations developed from their experiences with the installations.

PECHAKUCHA NIGHT: MUSE
May 5 • 7-9 p.m. • Spalding House • Free
Registration required: honolulumuseum.org/events
PechaKucha Night Honolulu is a free, informal event where creative people get together to share their ideas and work through six-minute presentations. It’s a rare chance to experience Spalding House at night! Limited to 200 guests.

BOOK CLUB
Participants read a book selected to connect museum artwork, then discuss in a relevant gallery with a museum docent. Free with museum admission. Information: 532-3621

The Secret Chord by Geraldine Brooks
March 25 + 29 • 1-3 p.m. 
Peeling away the myth to bring the Old Testament's King David to life in Second Iron Age Israel, Brooks traces the arc of his journey from obscurity to fame, from hero to traitor, from beloved king to murderous despot.

Goya by Robert Hughes
April 26 + 29 • 1-3 p.m. 
Read this book about the Spanish genius whose life and work bridged the transition from the 18th-century reign of the old masters to the early days of the 19th-century modern, then discuss it amidst his print series Disasters of War in the Works on Paper Gallery.

Euphoria by Lily King

May 27 + 31 • 1-3 p.m. 
Set between two World Wars and inspired by events in the life of revolutionary anthropologist Margaret Mead, Euphoria is a breathtaking novel about three young anthropologists of the 1930s caught in a love triangle that threatens their bonds, their careers, and, ultimately, their lives.

HoMA SELECT SHUTTLE TOUR
Tuesdays 1-3:30 p.m. • Through June 20 • Free with museum admission
Visitors can see the best of the Honolulu Museum of Art's collection at both its locations on this docent-led tour of works featured in the museum’s new Collection Highlights catalog. A docent leads guests on a 45-minute tour of such masterworks as the 11th-century statue of Guanyin and Modigliani’s Seated Nude, then takes them on the HoMA shuttle bus to Spalding House to see more masteworks in the exhibition HoMA Select.

The tour begins and ends at 900 Beretania Street. No reservation required, guests check in at the Visitor Information Center. 

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About the Honolulu Museum of Art

One of the world’s premier art museums, the Honolulu Museum of Art presents international caliber special exhibitions and features a collection that includes Hokusai, van Gogh, Gauguin, Monet, Picasso and Warhol, as well as traditional Asian and Hawaiian art.

Located in two of Honolulu’s most beautiful buildings, visitors enjoy two cafés, gardens, and films and concerts at the theater. The museum is dedicated to bringing together great art and people to create a more harmonious, adaptable, and enjoyable society in Hawai’i.

Locations:

Honolulu Museum of Art: 900 S. Beretania Street
Honolulu Museum of Art Spalding House: 2411 Makiki Heights Drive
Honolulu Museum of Art School: 1111 Victoria Street
Honolulu Museum of Art at First Hawaiian Center: 999 Bishop Street
Honolulu Museum of Art Doris Duke Theatre: 901 Kinau Street (at rear of museum)

Hours:

Honolulu Museum of Art: Tues–Sat 10 am–4:30pm; Sun 1–5 pm; closed Monday.

Honolulu Museum of Art Spalding House: Tues–Sat 10am–4pm; Sun noon–4pm

Admission (permits entry to both museums on the same day):

$10 general admission; children 17 and under are free.



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