District Art Exhibit Opens at Capital Square
The annual DMPS Art Exhibit opened last night with a reception in the atrium of Capital Square. This year the work of more than 1,200 students is on display, up nearly 500 from a year ago and nearly 500% since 2012.
Why the apparent explosion of creativity?
“After I got this job I realized that participation in this event was limited by the printed program,” said DMPS Visual Arts Coordinator Sara Dougherty while Velcro dotting some finishing touches into place Thursday afternoon.
Huh?
The necessarily limited number of works per page coupled with a desire to keep the program from becoming voluminous was having the unintended consequence of suppressing entries.
“I decided that we didn’t need to print a program,” said Dougherty, “and look what happened.”
Good thinking. What artists want people to see more than their name in fine print is their work on display, right? That’s how it looked last night as they and their patrons flocked to the public space festooned with their work to take pictures of the pictures.
Besides the individual projects, the long, vertical banners that ring the upper railing of the atrium represent every school in the district. They are the prime example of what Dougherty says is a big jump in collaborative entries in recent years. It took many hands to make most of those, as indicated by the handprints and signatures that mark some of them.
The event runs through March 7th and is free of charge. The Des Moines Public Schools Foundation, which just last month helped underwrite the annual district science fair at the Science Center of Iowa, is a co-sponsor.
The DMPS Foundation is a 501(c)(3) tax-exempt organization that accepts tax-deductible private contributions in support of its mission to provide some extras to teachers and students that state funding of public education no longer enables. In addition to the annual science fair and art exhibit, it supports the summer band camp and provides grants for teachers around the district. To learn more about the foundation click here: https://www.dmschools.org/community/foundation
