Founded in 1919 by Joseph G. Butler, Jr., The Butler Institute of American Art is the first museum of American art. The original structure is a McKim, Mead and White architectural masterpiece listed on the National Register of Historic places. Known worldwide as “America’s Museum”, the museum’s collection totals over 20,000 pieces in all media, and spans four centuries of work.
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EXHIBITIONS
In a New Light: American Impressionism 1870-1940
January 19 – April 12, 2020
In A New Light: American Impression 1870 – 1940 explores both the dissemination of Impressionism from its French roots into the American idiom and its reinterpretation of American landscape painting. Drawn from the Bank of America Collection, the works in the exhibition, by a diverse group of more than 75 artists, trace not only the development of Impressionism in the United States but also the emergence of a truly American style of painting. This exhibition has been loaned through the Bank of America Art in our Communities program. Learn more
Life Examined: The Impressionistic Realism of Sam Rosenthal
March 15 – July 12, 2020
Meet the Artist: To be rescheduled at a later date
Life Examined: The Impressionistic Realism of Sam Rosenthal is a collection of mostly large scale oil paintings of stimulating city and suburban landscapes. These works seek to draw the viewer into the image to experience the drama, mystery, and complexity of nature and humanity. Using his unique style refined to achieve a nuanced simplicity, Rosenthal shares his enhanced perspective of everyday life, creating comprehensively compelling and timeless imagery while eluding unessential details. The end result offers vignettes of the present, enlightened by the past, yet not limited by it. Learn more
Steranko and the American Superhero
May 3 – July 5, 2020
Meet the Artist: To be announced at a later date
The Butler Institute of American Art is proud to announce the Premiere Exhibition of 60 select paintings visualizing the most popular and prominent heroes dominating the current international entertainment scene. Across all mediums, from the cinema to comics, STERANKO was cited by Stan Lee as one of the prime architects of the Marvel Universe; the co-creator of NICK FURY, AGENT OF S.H.I.E.L.D.; and the artist-writer of CAPTAIN AMERICA, THE HULK, SUPERMAN, and THE X-MEN (for which he designed the classic title logo). He generated more than 150 original storytelling devices and techniques that changed the direction of the comics’ medium, and evolved a devoted cult of followers who nicknamed him The Innovator. Learn more
Dorothy Churchill-Johnson: PATTERN and REALISM, In Search Of The Big Picture
May 3 – June 14, 2020
Meet the Artist: May 3, 1-3pm
Dorothy Churchill-Johnson: PATTERN and REALISM, in Search of the Big Picture is comprised of three themes of large scale paintings. Kaleidoscopes, both fabric and nature, evoke the power of centrifugal force that runs the universe. Pavement and groundscapes express natural patterns and present the microcosm as a metaphor for the macrocosm. Surreal Landscapes have both waxing or waning transitional light evoking unique juxtapositions and a sense of isolated consciousness in a constantly changing universe. All the paintings are a synchronization of realism and abstraction through tiny details of ordinary things and expanding them to establish extremes. When viewing these works, the combination of color and enormous size can result in the viewer feeling as if they are looking at something familiar for the first time. Learn more
The Butler Institute of American Art’s 84th National Midyear Show
July 26 – August 30, 2020
Artist Reception and Awards Presentation: July 26, 1-3pm
This annual juried show exhibits the artworks of adult artists from throughout the fifty United States and its territories. The exhibition includes accepted works in all two dimensional media, including oil, watercolor, acrylic, pastel, drawings, prints, photographs and digital. For the 2019 exhibition, there were 652 works of art submitted by 260 artists and 78 works of art by 64 artists. The artists spanned 14 states across the United States. The juror for this year’s exhibition is contemporary New York artist Paul Ching-Bor. Learn more