Albany Film Screening of Thirst: A Civil War Story

thirstThe New York State Museum will host the upstate premiere of the 30-minute film Thirst: A Civil War Story (2013) on Saturday, May 11 from 1pm to 3pm in the Huxley Theatre.

The film is presented as part of the Museum’s exhibit An Irrepressible Conflict: The Empire State in the Civil War, a 7,000-square foot exhibition commemorating the sesquicentennial of the Civil War (on display through September 22). The free screening will be followed by a panel discussion with cast and crew. Read more

State Museum to Host Russel Wright Exhibition

manitoga2An exhibition featuring the work and philosophy of renowned industrial designer Russel Wright will open May 4, 2013 at the New York State Museum. Russel Wright: The Nature of Design explores Wright’s career from the 1920s through the 1970s and features approximately 40 objects along with photographs and design sketches.

On display through December 31 in the Crossroads Gallery, the exhibit was first organized by and presented at the Samuel Dorsky Museum of Art at the State University of New York at New Paltz from August 2012 to March 2013. The exhibit includes objects such as wood serving bowls and spun aluminum trays designed Pre-World War II as well as Wright’s more experimental and innovative Post-World War II designs, including earthenware plates, bowls, pitchers, and vases. Read more

Unique Stoneware Jug Depicting Entertainment Acquired

acrobat jug detailA four-gallon stoneware jug manufactured by Fulper Bros. in Flemington, New Jersey during the 1880s is now part of the New York State Museum’s Weitsman Collection of American Stoneware. Now on display at the State Museum, the historically significant piece of stoneware was recently acquired for the Museum by stoneware collector and benefactor, Adam Weitsman.

According to an announcement release to the press today, &#8220The acrobat jug, a sought-after example of decorated American stoneware, has been breaking stoneware record prices at auction for decades and Weitsman had wanted the piece for over thirty years.&#8221 Weitsman recently purchased the jug from Allen Katz Americana the statement says. Read more

A Tompkins County Civil War Love StoryNew Exhibition Opens At The NYS Museum

tarbell_portraitsAn exhibition featuring a Civil War love story, I Shall Think of You Often: The Civil War Story of Doctor and Mary Tarbell, opened Saturday, March 30, 2013 at the New York State Museum.

The exhibit focuses on the life and marriage of Doctor and Mary Tarbell of Tompkins County, New York, during the Civil War. The exhibition is presented in conjunction with An Irrepressible Conflict: The Empire State in the Civil War, a 7,000-square foot exhibition commemorating the sesquicentennial of the Civil War. Both exhibitions are open through September 22, 2013. Read more

Remembering Gordon Parks In 100 Moments

Gordon Parks bought his first camera in a pawn shop and got his first real photography job at the New Deal’s Farm Security Administration (FSA).&#8221American Gothic,&#8221 his bold arrangement of a White House cleaning lady with a mop in front of a flag, got him in trouble on his first assignment.

As a multifaceted creative artist, Parks stacked up firsts again and again in a long career that has been seeing numerous tributes over the past year.  2012 was the 100th anniversary of his birth, and exhibits are still underway. Read more

Lincoln Scholar to Speak at NYS Museum

Abraham Lincoln scholar Harold Holzer will present a lecture during the evening of Nov. 9 as part of an event highlighting a two-day exhibition of Lincoln’s preliminary Emancipation Proclamation at the New York State Museum.

Holzer will speak at 8 p.m. in the Clark Auditorium about “Lincoln and Liberty: Re-assessing the Preliminary Proclamation in the Age of Spielberg.” Author of the new book “Emancipating Lincoln,” Holzer will explore the ever-changing reputation of Lincoln’s Emancipation Proclamation from controversial and revolutionary order, to talismanic trophy, to maligned and misunderstood fraud — and back again to icon. The talk will come at the moment of the release of Steven Spielberg’s movie, “Lincoln,” which explores Lincoln’s concurrent roles as politician, peacemaker, and liberator. Read more

NYS Museum Displays Massive Civil War Flag

A massive, iconic Confederate flag, torn down by a Colonel Elmer Ellsworth, a soldier born in Saratoga County and widely remembered as the first Union officer killed in the Civil War, is now on display at the New York State Museum.

The 14-by 24-foot Marshall House Flag is being exhibited in South Hall through Feb. 24, 2013 in conjunction with the nearby 7,000-square foot exhibition on the Civil War. An Irrepressible Conflict: The Empire State in the Civil War is open through September 22, 2013 in Exhibition Hall. Read more

NYS Museum: New Deal Artists Exhibit Opens

A new exhibition &#8212- 1934: A New Deal for Artists &#8212- has opened at the New York State Museum showcasing paintings created against the backdrop of the Great  Depression with the support of the Public Works of Art Project (PWAP), the first federal government  program to support the arts nationally.

During the Great Depression, President Franklin Delano Roosevelt promised a &#8220new deal for the American people,&#8221 initiating government programs to foster economic recovery. Roosevelt’s pledge to help &#8220the forgotten man&#8221 also embraced America’s artists. Read more