Online edition: Volume 16, Number 7 - November 18, 1999.                  

Inside WSU 11/18/1999

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More about the Ulrich Museum

Art trivia

The Ulrich Museum’s smallest painting is 2 inches by 4 inches and depicts a row of very short, brightly colored strips. It’s by Jay Rosenbloom.

The largest painting is about 40 feet long and 8 feet high. It is "Symbols" by contemporary African-American artist Benny Andrews. It is actually 11 paintings that form a huge mural.

There are more than 500 portraits by or of Americans in the Ulrich collection.

Avenue for the creative

One of the museum’s most popular exhibitions was Duane Hanson’s "Real People" presenting several lifelike figures molded in clay and cast in polyester resin and fiberglass, including the rodeo cowboy, the cheerleader and the sunbather. About 32,000 visitors saw this exhibition during its 21-day showing in October 1976.

"Neonics," shown February-March 1991, featured neon sculptures, with pieces such as "Pop Shark" that depicted a shark popping out of toaster and a dinosaur head that opened and closed its mouth. The museum also exhibited 100 photographs of vintage 1924-61 neon signs in Wichita.

A holography exhibition in fall 1979 featured three-dimensional floating laser photographs where ghostly images could wink and blow kisses and the viewers.

"Atrabiliarios" (Defiant) by Colombian artist Doris Salcedo, which opened in August 1997, displayed women’s shoes of all different styles, sizes and colors partially obscured behind barely translucent pieces of stretched cow bladders.

Sculptor Sandy Skoglund’s "In the Last Hour" in January 1994 featured chartreuse, glowing green cats scavenging for food in a kitchen and purple squirrels on a hot-pink patio. "The Cocktail Party" featured thousands of cheese-doodles covering furniture, walls, the floor and party-goers.

About the galleries

In 1995, the Ulrich Museum galleries were redesigned, refurbished and given donor names.

The galleries named for benefactors who donated funds for the renovations are: the Joan S. Beren Gallery, the Floyd and Barbara Amsden Gallery, the Chris Paulsen Polk Gallery, the Wilson Gallery, and the Sam and Jacque Kouri Sculpture Terrace.

The Charles Grafly Gallery was named for the Pennsylvania sculptor and teacher whose studio works were donated to the museum in 1971.

The Doris Caesar Sculpture Court was named for the American sculptor. Her husband donated the works in the court in 1974.

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Inside WSU is published by the Office of University Communications for Wichita State University faculty, staff and friends on biweekly Thursdays during the fall and spring semesters. Items to be considered for publication should be sent to campus box 62 or amy.geiszler-jones@wichita.edu 10 days before publication.

Editor
Amy Geiszler-Jones

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Kang, Tae-wook