No one is quite sure how it got there. Even fewer people understand what it is. And it’s almost impossible to find someone who knows what’s inside. We’re talking about SMU’s Meadows Museum, of course.
This should come as no surprise, however. To any student who has spent more than a semester on the illustrious Hilltop, SMU’s museums might as well be nothing more than collegiate folklore for tour groups to harp on. But with a wealth of museums on campus featuring student and professional works of art year round and the amount of money students pay for these amenities, why is this the case?
It isn’t possible for the tanning pool at the Dedman Center to be packed with the recent plunging temperatures. Galleries across campus from the Doolin to the Pollock to Meadows have too long been underused. The very people who should be taking advantage of seeing these many provocative works for free aren’t.
Last night, the Meadows Museum held a sparsely attended student reception, featuring the museum’s two newest exhibitions: “Coming of Age: American Art 1850s to 1950s” and “Jerry Bywaters: Interpreter of the Southwest & Lone Star Printmaker.”
Featuring 71 paintings and sculptures from the Addison Gallery of American Art on the campus of the Phillips Academy in Andover, Mass., “Coming of Age” highlights American art across a century. Organized with the American Federation of Arts, “Coming of Age: American Art, 1850s to 1950s” showcases the development of American Art from the Hudson River School through Abstract Expressionism, featuring such emblematic artists as Asher B. Durand, Winslow Homer, James McNeill Whistler, Thomas Eakins, John Singer Sargent, Frederic Remington, Edward Hopper, Georgia O’Keeffe, Alexander Calder, David Smith, Jackson Pollock and Frank Stella.
Celebrating the 100th anniversary of the artist’s birth, “Jerry Bywaters: Interpreter of the Southwest & Lone Star Printmaker” focuses on a lifetime spent participating in and studying the cultural life of the American Southwest by Dallas art figure Jerry Bywaters (1906-1989). The title is drawn from an unpublished essay about Bywaters by his longtime friend, Dr. John Chapman. An active painter, professor Bywaters served for 35 years as a faculty member in Southern Methodist University’s Division of Fine Arts and as director of the Dallas Museum of Fine Arts from 1943 to 1964.
The student reception featured live jazz music, food and refreshments. It’s too bad you all missed out on an event for which you had already paid.
So get out there and think of SMU’s museums as less of a campus relic and more of an opportunity. Your memories will thank you.
