Pillars of the OKC arts community

Editor's note: As part of our recent multimedia feature on OKC's arts community, we looked at a few of Oklahoma City's arts pillars. We hope this piece and previous posts on DG Smalling and Denise Duong will whet your appetite to check out the "Visual Arts in OKC" feature story on greateroklahomacity.com and share it with family, friends, neighbors and potential residents/investors.

Very early in our city’s life, the arts were revered and celebrated by the civic leaders of the day. Within a couple of decades, the bedrock arts organizations had been created, many of which still anchor the cultural life of Oklahoma City. All have evolved and adapted and some have merged together, but the intention of our founders remains as powerful as ever. The arts in Oklahoma City are to be celebrated, and accessible to all. 

OKLAHOMA CITY MUSEUM OF ART

The Oklahoma City Museum of Art’s roots trace to early statehood efforts of the Oklahoma Art League and Art Renaissance Club, organizations concerned with art education for a young city. Over time, more formal efforts began with a Works Progress Administration (WPA) Experimental Gallery, which was open to the public. The Museum transitioned from a federally funded gallery to a private institution when it was incorporated on May 18, 1945.

The Museum today is the synthesis of two predecessors, the Oklahoma Art Center, itself an outgrowth of the WPA Experimental Gallery, and the Oklahoma Museum of Art. Although both institutions were committed to collecting, public programs, and exhibitions, a depressed economy following the downturn in the energy industry during the 1980s challenged the city’s ability to support two institutions and led to a merger of the two museums in 1989. Museum leaders seized the opportunity to bring a new Oklahoma City Museum of Art to maturation as a single, financially secure entity.

Read the full story on VeloCityOKC.com.