Off Hours: 3 things to look for at the University of Iowa's new Stanley Museum of Art
Ahoy, people of Des Moines. I’m your local arts and entertainment reporter and, so far this year, my favorite movie is a hotly contested position between “Everything Everywhere, All at Once” or “Nope” — (but I’m expecting “RRR” to be in the running once I watch it).
Welcome to Off Hours, your free weekly newsletter from the Des Moines Register that showcases all things fun you can do in central Iowa. If you sign up for our newsletter, you get to see this early Thursday morning in your inbox.
The Deal
Here’s the deal: When I was a student at the University of Iowa, the school was still recovering from the flood of 2008. Over the course of my college career, I was able to see most of what was damaged or lost in the flood replaced or reconstructed.
A new music building was built after the completion of the Voxman Building in 2016 as was the new Hancher Auditorium while the Iowa Memorial Union was renovated in 2015. But the Stanley Museum of Art’s promised upgrade was elusive during my time there.
Though I got a taste of the kind of art collected by the UI with exhibits that went up in the Iowa Memorial Union, I never had a chance to grasp the breadth and tone of the art my alma mater had under its umbrella.
That changed last week when I had the chance to check out the new space as part of the museum's media day held just before the public opening of the new building.
After being away from Iowa City for just over a year, it was cool to head back to campus and find a full building in what had been a mostly empty plot of land. Even cooler was to find that its footprint was not as intrusive on the adjacent park as I’d feared it might be.
Once I got inside, the thing that struck me most about the museum's collection was the way art was displayed. The museum blended different mediums of art and art of various cultural backgrounds in a way I’ve never seen before.
Something that looked like a Grant Wood painting could appear next to a woven basket while a photograph of a Black girl looking through a window at a shop hung nearby. Since the descriptions and titles for the works had yet to come in I decided to ask Lauren Lessing, the museum’s director, about what I was seeing.
“I’m so thrilled that you’re seeing that even without text on the wall,” Lauren told me when I brought this up.
“We really tried to install this exhibition in a way that upended hierarchies and those included hierarchies of cultures and hierarchies of media,” she continued. “We pulled the African art and the indigenous art out of an anthropological framework...
“Traditionally in the western world, paintings and marble and sculptures and bronze get all the love while textiles and ceramics are seen as folk art or craft and further down the hierarchy or sidelines. We wanted to show that not only were textiles as important as paintings, but they were hugely influential for the modern and contemporary artists that we see and know today."
The museum, located at 160 W. Burlington St., is free and open to the public as of last week Friday. Check it out the next time you happen to be in Iowa City!
Have you seen the new Stanley Museum of Art? Let me know what you think of it at ihamlet@registermedia.com.
My Top Three Things to Check Out at the Stanley Museum of Art
Lightwell: Technically not a piece of art in and of itself, the lightwell is an area for displaying art. Located to your left if you enter the museum through the main entrance, the area is designed to hold sculptures or even hanging art in an outdoor portion of the museum that, during the day, is naturally lit. Currently, the piece on show in there is Untitled, a glazed ceramic piece by the Japanese-American artist Jun Kaneko.
“Mural”: Listen, there are not a lot of visual artists out there that reach the level of acclaim as the likes of Jackson Pollock. Being in a room with this canvas piece, colored with oil and casein, is a can’t miss experience — literally, the painting is nearly 20 feet long, if you’re in a room with it you’ll notice.
Bamileke-Dogon Ku’ngang Mask: This piece created by Hervé Youmbi is included in a collection of African. While visiting, I got to speak to Cory Gundlach, the museum's curator of African art, about how this more contemporary piece fit in next to the traditional masks.
“(Youmbi) interrogates the role of the African mask in the museum and — in his own way — interrogates how African masks support these conventional notions of ritual and spirituality as the main context for their interpretation,” Corey said. “He’s opening up to recognize the global circulation of African masks and the way they’re performed in the museum and how they represent African culture.”
More: Plan your visit to Iowa City's new Stanley Museum around these 9 pieces of art
Eat This, Drink That
Chicken souvlaki, $8.49: This flatbread sandwich is my ideal form of comfort food. All the ingredients — from the red onion to tzatziki sauce — are balanced in just such a way that I can taste all of them alongside the marinated chicken without any one flavor overwhelming the others. On top of that, I like all of the flavors and they feel healthy enough to eat that I feel good after eating it.
Get it: Z'Mariks Noodle Café is located at 12655 University Ave. in Clive. The restaurant is open from 10:30 a.m. to 9 p.m. every day except for Sunday when the venue closes at 8 p.m. Reach the restaurant at 515-223-9605.
If you happen to be in Iowa City to see the Stanley Museum of Art, Z’Mariks also has a downtown location there at 19 S. Dubuque St.
Barrel-aged Velvet Stout, $14: I'm not usually one to go for rich stouts, but nursing this drink over the course of an hour alongside a burger offered a satisfying contrast. The drink provides a lot of low notes, chocolaty and sweet, playing underneath the hoppy bitterness. It's offers a nice dichotomy to most of the generally overt flavors of Big Groves' food items.
Get it: Des Moines’ recently opened Big Grove Brewery at 555 17th St. is open from 3 to 11 p.m. Tuesdays through Thursday, 11 a.m. to 11:45 p.m. on Friday and Saturday, as well as 11 a.m. to 10 p.m. on Sunday. The venue is closed on Mondays. Reach the brewery at 515-777-2337.
If you happen to be in Iowa City to see the Stanley Museum of Art, Big Grove also has a location there at the edge of downtown at 1225 S. Gilbert St.
More: Big Grove Brewery brings a giant taproom and restaurant to Des Moines this week
48 Hours Off
Friday evening: The Junction Speaks is an event that’s free and open to the public and is part of the Taste of the Junction series. This Friday event runs from 5 to 8 p.m. at the Raccoon River Nature Lodge, 2500 Grand Ave., in West Des Moines. The evening will include live jazz, refreshments and storytelling done via slideshow. The next afternoon Valley Junction will also have its multicultural festival.
Saturday afternoon: The Sleepy Hollow Renaissance Fair is back in action this year with a variety of activities from Celtic Ceilidh to Steampunk cosplay. The event is held at 4051 Dean Ave. in Des Moines with tickets starting at $19.
Sunday night: The Des Moines Symphony will be giving a "Hooray for Hollywood" that’s free to attend. The event will be held at Water Works Park, 2201 George Flagg Pkwy., in Des Moines at 7:30 p.m. and features performances of music from favorite films such as “Star Wars,” “The Wizard of Oz” and many more.
Listen To This
The album “Dream About A Cowboy” was released on Aug. 26 by Eleanor Grace, and it’s one I found myself enjoying quite a bit — I think largely due to the fact that, even though I'm not the biggest country fan, it leaned just enough toward folk music that I found myself humming along.
I really enjoyed the songs “Nothing’s Real” and “Season Finale,” though I imagine “Butterflies” and “Did Yourself In” will be songs that appeal more to country music fans.
Though this is her first full album, Grace has been making music locally for three years now and cites Florence + The Machine and Rachael Yamagata among her influences.
The artist's website is eleanor-grace.com and her album is available to stream on Spotify and other music streaming platforms.
Do you know of any local musical artists releasing albums? Let me know about them at ihamlet@registermedia.com.
Around Town
From Alanis Morissette to ZZ Top, which Iowa State Fair concert sold the most tickets?
Quad Cities-based chain Barrel House brings a robot server, beer and burgers to Des Moines
Farmers' Almanac declares North Central region a 'hibernation zone' this winter
Heading to Kinnick Stadium for an Iowa football game? Here’s where to eat in Iowa City
Ames High grad co-edits Wolf Blitzer's Holocaust documentary airing Friday
My Day Job
Thanks for reading. You can expect to see a fair bit of local stuff from me in the next few weeks. I have a piece about local musician Dan Tedesco and his unique way of approaching music as an indie artist. I have a piece on some Des Moines filmmakers who locally filmed a pilot for a planned comedy show. After that, I should have another piece on opera singer Simon Estes on the horizon.
Also, look for an interview with Bernadette Peters in advance of her Des Moines Civic Center performance.
Next week, I'm handing things back to my editor, Susan Stapleton, who'll be telling you what's in store that weekend!
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This article originally appeared on Des Moines Register: Off Hours: Iowa welcomes new art museum, UI's Stanley Museum of Art
