(LITTLE ROCK, AR) – The Arkansas Arts Center announces the 2010-11 exhibition season.  In celebration of its 50th anniversary, the Arkansas Arts Center has planned a year of extraordinary exhibitions to ensure that learning, inspiration and creative expression in the arts flourish throughout Arkansas, for people of all ages and backgrounds.

The 2010-11 exhibition season begins with Degrees of Density: Selections from the Kentler Flatfiles on view through August 22, 2010, in the Stella Boyle Smith Gallery.  The Kentler International Drawing Space, located in Brooklyn, N.Y., is dedicated to contemporary drawings and works on paper. Each year, the Kentler invites a curator to select a show from its drawing flatfiles. This year, Marilyn Symmes of the Zimmerli Art Museum at Rutgers University is the curator of Degrees of Density: Selections from the Kentler Flatfiles. Symmes selected 54 contemporary drawings that prompt insights about what is possible in drawing and about fundamental aspects of nature.

Bigger, Better, More: The Art of Viola Frey will be held August 20 – November 28, 2010, in the Jeannette Edris Rockefeller and Townsend Wolfe Galleries.  This exhibition is co-organized by the Gardiner Museum, Toronto, and the Racine Art Museum, Wisconsin.  Viola Frey is best known for her brilliantly colored, literally larger-than-life ceramic figures.  This exhibition is the first major exhibition of ceramist Viola Frey’s work since her death in 2004.  Frey’s plates, paintings and drawings will also be on view.

As part of a city-wide celebration of the 100th anniversary of the Mexican Revolution, the Arkansas Arts Center will present A Century of Revolution: Mexican Art since 1910 September 1 – November 21, 2010, in the Winthrop Rockefeller Gallery.  The 1910 Revolution in Mexico was the starting point in a series of struggles that brought political and social change. Each turning point in the conflict prompted a flurry of artistic creativity. Curated by Sarah Holian, this exhibition illustrates these visions for revolution through the renowned collections of Mexican art housed at the University of Texas, Austin, and private collections. This exhibition is divided into four themes – A Century of Revolution, Theaters of Revolution, Student Revolutions and Revolutionary Identities.  Featured artists include Diego Rivera, José Clemente Orozco, José Guadalupe Posada, Manuel Manilla, Arnold Belkin, Pedro Coronel, Jose Luis Cuevas, Rocio Maldonado, Julio Gálan and more.

On December 3, 2010 – January 2, 2011, the Arkansas Arts Center will display the 42nd Collectors Show & Sale in the Sam Strauss, Sr. and Stella Boyle Smith Galleries.  An Arkansas Arts Center tradition, the Collectors Show & Sale brings a taste of the New York gallery scene to Little Rock, presenting a variety of works on paper from more than 20 galleries.

The 37th Toys Designed by Artists exhibition will be held December 17, 2010 – February 20, 2011, in the Jeannette Edris Rockefeller Gallery.  This international juried exhibition presents works that are toys or about toys.

The 53rd Annual Delta Exhibition will be on view December 17, 2010 – February 20, 2011, in the Townsend Wolfe Gallery.  The Annual Delta Exhibition showcases contemporary works by artists from Arkansas and the six bordering states.  This juried exhibition has grown to encompass works in all media and offers a snapshot of contemporary art being made in the Mid-South.

The 2010-11 exhibition season will continue with the Young Arkansas Artists 50th Annual Exhibition March 15 – April 17, 2011 in the Atrium, Sam Strauss, Sr. and Stella Boyle Smith Galleries.  In 1961, the Arkansas Arts Center hosted its first statewide children’s art exhibition.  This year celebrates the 50th anniversary of the Young Arkansas Artists Exhibition. Organized by the Arkansas Arts Center, the Young Arkansas Artists exhibition showcases artworks in all media created by students in kindergarten through 12th grade in Arkansas schools.

Michael Peterson: Evolution / Revolution will be held March 18 – July 3, 2011, in the Winthrop Rockefeller Gallery.  This exhibition features over 30 wood sculptures inspired by the geographic environment of the Pacific Northwest. Following the unique trajectory of wood sculptor Michael Peterson over the past twenty years, this exhibition traces the evolution from the artist's early lathe turned bowls to his current, revolutionary sculptures devoid of the lathe.  This exhibition is organized by the Bellevue Arts Museum and has been made possible by the generous support of The Windgate Charitable Foundation.  Additional support has been made possible by the Institute of Museum and Library Services.

On April 1 – June 26, 2011, the Arkansas will host the major exhibition The Impressionists and their Influence. Organized by the High Museum of Art, Atlanta and the Arkansas Arts Center, this exhibition brings together works by important French and American Impressionist and French Post-Impressionist artists from the High Museum of Art, Atlanta, the Arkansas Arts Center, and private collections. Works by Monet, Pissarro, Vuillard, Renoir, Hassam, Cassatt and others tell how these artists broke the rules and made inroads to Modernism.

The 2010-11 exhibition season ends with A Couple Ways of Doing Something, Photographs by Chuck Close, Poems by Bob Holman April 29 – July 26, 2011, in the Atrium, Sam Strauss, Sr. and Stella Boyle Smith Galleries.  This exhibition features daguerreotype photographs of leading contemporary artists by Chuck Close, paired with Bob Holman's witty and beautifully typeset poems.  Aperture, a not-for-profit organization devoted to photography and the visual arts, has organized this traveling exhibition and produced the accompanying publication.  This project was made possible through the generous support of Lannan Foundation and Carey C. Shuart.

The Arkansas Arts Center Collectors Group recently purchased an etching by Chuck Close for the Arkansas Arts Center collection. The work, Marta / Fingerprint of 1985, adds a significant example to the Arts Center’s strong collection of photorealist works.            For more information, visit www.arkarts.com or call 501-372-4000.

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