To celebrate the 9th annual Art Museum Day, Shelburne Museum will offer half-price admission on Friday, May 18.
The theme for Art Museum Day 2018 is Hyperconnected Museums, a recognition of the many ways in which museums serve as central points of connectivity within their communities, both online and in person. Art museums are often anchors for public spaces and neighborhoods, and they partner with school systems and civic organizations in ways that make their towns, cities and regions better places for everyone who lives and works there. Hyperconnected Museums also serve as engines for the creative economy, tapping the human creativity embedded in works of art — whether thousands of years old or as recent as 2018 — to inspire new ideas and ways of thinking.
“I am thrilled that Shelburne Museum is again participating in Art Museum Day, an opportunity to bring communities together to experience great art and special programs, both in Vermont and across North America,” said Christine Anagnos, executive director of the Association of Art Museum Directors, which organizes Art Museum Day. “Art is vital to our lives, a reflection of both the incredible diversity of humanity and the many common elements that unite us.”
The Shelburne Museum is the largest art and history museum in northern New England; its Pizzagalli Center for Art and Education and Webb Gallery feature important American paintings by Andrew Wyeth, Winslow Homer, Grandma Moses, John Singleton Copley, and many more.
Among the special exhibitions up now is “Puppets: World on a String,” on view at the Pizzagalli Center through June 3. This show provides an introductory survey to the art of puppets, presenting a range of historical to contemporary works in a variety of mediums and forms. This immersive exhibition will transport visitors into magical realms where animals speak, shadows come alive, and politicians face their harshest critics. Storytelling and the visual arts collide in this exciting exhibition featuring multimedia works of art by local and national artists. From 19th century marionettes to contemporary digital installations, these works push the boundaries of our concepts of this age-old art form. “Puppets: World on a String” celebrates the wonder of puppets while investigating the ways that puppet theater mediates between worlds both real and imagined.
Among the artists featured in the exhibit are Jim Henson and Andy Warhol.
Shelburne Museum is on Route 7; more information is at shelburnemuseum.org.