Dedicated Space

What is art? What is education? To what extent can art and education converge to create an organizing philosophy for a cultural institution? The pursuit of these questions has propelled Oklahoma Contemporary’s growth since its founding in 1989 as City Arts Center.

We believe in the potential for the works we present to inspire our visitors to engage more deeply with the ideas, materials, and influences behind the art on view. This belief motivates us to infuse education into our curatorial and program planning, integrating art objects and performances with their respective potential to share and generate knowledge. Rather than confining education to a classroom, we create the conditions for the learning process to happen throughout the arts center’s many spaces. What are some of these spaces? To name but a few, we have dedicated studios for early childhood education, digitalmedia, ceramics, sculpture, and dance.

Our Learning Gallery gives visitors the opportunity to access different points of entry for the artworks on view by getting hands-on with special creative activities or by engaging with interactive displays. Our theater, creative lounge, and outdoor spaces offer further ways to learn through artist talks, panel discussions, and documentary screenings.

During Camp Contemporary, a program of week-long camps for ages four through twelve during school breaks, these spaces are active with young people learning and creating in a variety of media, from painting and installation art to digital illustration and theater.

The kids aren’t the only ones who get to take advantage of these amazing new studios. On March 30, 2020, Oklahoma Contemporary will launch Studio School, the arts center’s new home for year-round classes and workshops across disciplines for teens and adults. While classes have always been offered at Oklahoma Contemporary, our new building and adjacent renovated warehouse space support our goal to meet rising demand for innovative workshops and sequential art courses by quadrupling the number of classes we could previously offer—to fifty—for the spring session.

Adrienne Lalli Hills, associate director of Studio School, sums up our philosophy succinctly.

“Studio School seeks to nurture and strengthen Oklahoma’s creative community through rigorous yet inviting classes and dynamic workshops while providing employment and professional development opportunities for artists,” she says.

Like the generation of knowledge, the creation of art is cumulative. Contemporary art exists in three periods at once: Its impulse is rooted in works and artists of the past. It is created in the present, but it prefigures what the future will bring. As such, contemporary art has the potential to link the knowledge of the past to the new ideas of the future through creation in the present. Through our exhibitions, performances, and education initiatives, Oklahoma Contemporary can be a creative catalyst for our visitors, students, and instructors for years to come.

Reflecting on this future potential, Hills offers the perfect summation: “We hope to provide a vibrant profile of high-caliber classes that support interdisciplinary inquiry in all visual and performing arts. Not an artist? No problem. From teens to arts enthusiasts to established artists and makers, everyone is welcome.”

Jeremiah Matthew Davis is the artistic director of Oklahoma Contemporary Arts Center.
oklahomacontemporary.org