Whitney Kids Summer Family Day
Jul 26, 2016
A young visitor explores Stuart Davis’s Swing Landscape (1938), July 2016. Photograph by Andrew Kist
The Whitney welcomed families to the Museum on July 9 for a day of music, artmaking, and family-friendly guided tours celebrating Stuart Davis: In Full Swing and other exhibitions on view this summer.
Musicians from Jazz at Lincoln Center perform in the Hess Family Theater, July 2016. Photograph by Andrew Kist
One of the day’s highlights was a performance by Jazz at Lincoln Center. Four jazz musicians delighted kids and adults alike with their musical interpretations of Davis’s iconic works. The quartet played popular jazz songs, including Miles Davis’s Rocker in response to The Mellow Pad (1945-51), and Dizzy Gillespie’s Oo Pa Pa Da in response to Owh! In San Pao (1951) shown in the photograph above. “We paint in sound, just like Stuart Davis painted in colors,” band leader Riley Mulherkar told a spellbound audience.
A young visitor works on a collage inspired by the work of Stuart Davis, July 2016. Photograph by Andrew Kist
In the Laurie M. Tisch Education Center, kids were invited to experiment with the abstract shapes that populate Davis’s paintings by making collages. Billie Rae Vinson, Coordinator of Family Programs, said that “The project was inspired by Davis’s love of the jazz scene in the 1930s, 40s, and 50s, and was designed to encourage participants to express the shapes, colors, and rhythms of the city itself.”
A family participates in artmaking in the fifith floor outdoor gallery, July 2016. Photograph by Andrew Kist
Families participated in another artmaking activity in Virginia Overton’s Sculpture Gardens exhibition in the fifth floor outdoor gallery. Using the city view and Overton’s installation as their inspiration, families made drawings in wire. Vinson reflected on this activity: “Seeing visitors of all ages outside—drawing, interacting, looking at the shapes of the city, and engaging with the building—was wonderful.”
Learn more about Family Programs at the Whitney here.
By Olivia Horn, Interpretation Intern