HYDE PARK — The Smart Museum of Art is planning two major exhibits with nearly 20 curators to celebrate its 40th anniversary.
Starting Sept. 27, the museum's vast collection of sculptures will be on display for “Carved, Cast, Crumpled: Sculpture All Ways.”
All 8,800 feet of gallery space will be taken over by pieces dating to some of the museum’s first acquisitions of modern sculpture in the Joel Starrels Jr. Memorial Collection.
The exhibit will run through Dec. 21.
Also starting on Sept. 27, theater group 500 Clowns will begin its stint as “interpreter in residence” in a temporary space in the center of the museum at 5550 S. Greenwood Ave.
During the residency, artists Adrian Danzig and Rebecca Stevens will explore new ways to connect visitors with art through circus arts, improvisation and performance for 10 months.
On Feb. 12, 17 guest curators will have access to the museum's collection to create micro-exhibits for “Objects and Voices: A Collection of Stories.”
Professors, artists, museum professionals, University of Chicago students, Smart staffers and others have been asked to find new connections between the pieces in the Smart Museum's collection of modern, Asian, European, and contemporary art.
The exhibit will run through June 14, 2015.
“Over the course of the season our 40th anniversary projects will transform the look and feel of the Smart, by showcasing the collection in new ways and by engaging with a host of collaborators to ask big questions about art,” said Anthony Hirschel, director of the museum.
Admission to the museum is free and galleries are open from 10 a.m.-5 p.m. Tuesdays through Sundays, with extended hours on Thursday evenings until 8 p.m.
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