The Belger Crane Yard Studios Gallery presents After Hours: Belger Arts Employee Exhibition, which opens Friday, March 5, and remains on view through June 5, 2021.

After Hours showcases the artistic talents of the artists who are members of the Belger Arts staff. While Belger Arts (comprised of Belger Arts Center, Belger Crane Yard Studios and Crane Yard Clay) is known for its ceramics exhibitions and programs, the artists who work here represent a range of media, including glass, wood, mixed media and ceramics. The works on view also reflect a diversity of approaches, techniques and themes.

Executive Director Evelyn Craft Belger said, “The artists in After Hours not only creatively problem-solve on a daily basis as Belger Arts employees, they are dynamic artists, as well. The exhibition provides the public an opportunity to see work by a new generation of contemporary artists who also contribute to a thriving arts community.”

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“This is and always will be where my heart is. It is what I care about.” – William Christenberry

Over the course of many decades contemporary art icon William Christenberry made annual pilgrimages to Hale County, Alabama, documenting the landscape, its architecture and its transformation. Tracing Time offers an examination of Christenberry’s relationship to Hale County, where he spent his summers as a child, its influence on his conceptual approach and artistic vision, and the psychology of place and memory.

The exhibition includes photographs, drawings, paintings and sculptures from the Belger Collection, some never before seen in Kansas City. The evolution of Christenberry’s experimental, creative process is also presented in displays of source material pages from his sketchbooks, photographs that served as foundations for drawings and structures, and rare early constructions from the early 1960s. The artist’s father, a woodworker and a strong early influence on the artist, would create models of buildings that were important to him out of simple, sometimes unrefined materials. One of these buildings is included in the exhibition.

Christenberry’s deep affection for Hale County, his curiosity about the effects of mankind and nature on the landscape, reveal a poignant perspective on the passage of time and chronicle the life cycle of place. Although profoundly personal and geographically specific, the themes of William Christenberry’s work are universal and remain relevant.

Join us for our debut FIRST FRIDAY event in 2021 featuring our youth artists! Stop by and view the latest art in various mediums by our and join in on a variety of activities, silent auction, shop and create your own masterpiece. FUN for the whole family. Non-Ticket Event! Free Parking.

Please join us for an exhibit featuring Kate Fromm, an outstanding graduating senior from the Kansas City Art Institute Fiber Department.

Who Makes You? presents a series of works that reflect on the influence of the artist’s professors, peers and friends during the past four years at The Kansas City Art Institute. Brimming with color, her large scale works on silk panels combine intuitive mark making and employ a less traditional approach to shibori resist dyeing. Fromm relates these stratified compositions to her engagement with the learning process where she considers time, memory and relationships. In the long term, four years is a blip in time, but in the short term it can be a time of unimaginable growth and expansion. Reflecting on her last four years, Fromm’s works consider her influences and poses a question back to the viewer. Who makes you? 

Artist bio: Kate Fromm grew up in a small town outside of St. Louis where she was able to explore rural landscapes. There she documented the world that surrounded her before moving to Kansas City to pursue a Bachelor’s degree at the Art Institute. Once in college Fromm found a need to work with more hands on materials after taking a screen printing elective, thus prompting her to major in fiber arts. As a fiber major she began to explore color interactions through weaving and large scale works on silk panels. Her works focus on color, scale, time and movement.