After her son painted a picture using chocolate syrup, Mihee Kim-Kort’s other children grabbed her wrist and dragged her across the museum to another activity.
As part of the First Thursdays event series, the IU Eskanazi Museum of Art had several works of art, activities and games for visitors to interact with in celebration of Black History Month.
“It was a great way to kick off Black History Month,” Kim-Kort said. “I’d never taken the kids to the museum before and it’s just such a wealth of resources and a lot of fun for the community.”
To highlight the month, the museum featured four works — “Lightning Lipstick” by Robert Colescott, “Bark of the Timber, Fog of the Night” by Thornton Dial, “Cross Section” by Richard Hunt and “La Reine” by Harold Cousins — by famous black creators.
On top of the display of art pieces, the event featured activities such as live poetry, painting with chocolate, I-spy and a photo scavenger hunt.
Abe Morris, manager of public relations and marketing, said First Thursdays are great because they bring together the University and the region. He said it brought people in who can’t come during their normal hours when the museum closes at 5 p.m.
“It’s a really great mix,” Morris said. “It’s real popular with families and students. You get to meet so many new people. We’ve got a real diverse group of people coming to these events.”
One of the exhibits was “Hidden Faces” by Charles Audu. He painted portraits of famous black figures in history and cut the pictures into squares. It was up to the participants to put his work back together. If they could reassemble the portraits and name the figure, they would win an envelope containing anywhere between $1 and $20.
“I wanted to represent the fact that we’re all hidden faces in the crowd,” Audu said. “But with all the hard work all these people did, they have impacted our culture in a really powerful way.”
Audu said he felt blessed to have an exhibit in the museum. He smiled as the crowd started to pour into his area and dozens of hands reached toward his paper squares. It was only 30 minutes into the night.
“This makes me feel amazing,” Audu said.
