Thomas Hart Benton and Hollywood Exhibit

Our KCPL Power Partners retirement club toured the American Epics Thomas Hart Benton and Hollywood exhibit at the Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art in Kansas City, MO on December 3, 2015.

Most of the attendees did not realize the involvement in Hollywood that Benton had in the 30's and 40's. Many of the art works had never been shown in the gallery before. Benton was an amazingly prolific artist. Lunch was before the tour in the Rozzelle Court. 

The painting below is Benton's depiction of Hollywood.  The work was commissioned by a magazine....can't remember if it was Life or Time.  This is the only Benton painting that I will post since photos were not allowed in the exhibit.  I got this copy from the internet.

Here is what the Nelson folks had to say about the exhibit.

"The first major exhibition on Thomas Hart Benton in more than 25 years, American Epics: Thomas Hart Benton and Hollywood reveals the fascinating but overlooked relationship between Benton’s art, movie making and visual storytelling in 20th-century America.

Benton’s early experiences on silent movie sets in Fort Lee, New Jersey—the first “Hollywood”—and later in Hollywood itself influenced his acute awareness of contemporary storytelling’s shift toward movies and inspired his signature style of painting that melded centuries-old traditions with more recent movie-production techniques to tell stories that appealed to a broad range of Americans.

The exhibition brings together nearly 100 works by Benton including 50 paintings and murals, as well as a selection of his drawings, prints and illustrated books. It also presents rarely seen archival photographs, related ephemera, film clips and stills that highlight the allure of his paintings’ cinematic content, composition and technical underpinnings."

Manger scene in Kirkwood Hall.

Lunch at Rozzelle Court before the tour.

American artist, Philip Haas, has his "The Four Seasons" on display on the Donald J Hall (think Hallmark Cards) Sculpture Park outside the museum.

Massive columns are an architectural feature of Kirkwood Hall. 

A few of the art pieces at the entry to the museum from the parking garage.

Our group waiting for our tour guides.

A special showing of a book of Nelson's works that one of our members donated to the Nelson was held in the Spencer Art Reference Library.

Sigrid really enjoyed the day.

If you ever find yourself in Kansas City and looking for things to do, a visit to the Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art is a great place to tour.  You can spend anywhere from an hour to a couple of days and probably still not see everything.  It is a world class collection of art.

Kansas City Chiefs Arrowhead Stadium Tour - 11/17/2015

Our retirement club toured Arrowhead Stadium on November 17, 2015 on a cold and rainy day.  There were nearly 40 people in our group.  We gathered  in the Pro Shop before the tour and as you might expect, there were lots of old people wearing Kansas City Chiefs red stuff before we all left that day.

A short video presentation was made before the walking tour.  The video highlighted the Chiefs history and the stadium.  We divided into two groups for the tour.

The Arrowhead Club is a huge area to eat and drink while watching the game from a gazillion different monitors.  You can stay warm while there.  Atmosphere must be worth something....otherwise, why would you go to a game, pay huge fees to park your car, pay even larger amounts to purchase food and drink, weave your way through 80,000 other people just to watch the game indoors on a big TV.

The Kansas City Royals Kauffman Stadium across the parking lot from Arrowhead.  The Royals are the reigning World Champions of baseball in 2015.

More Arrowhead Club.

Our tour guide was a Chief's Red Coater.  They are a group of super fans who volunteer for all kinds of duties at Arrowhead as well as all sorts of community activities and charities.  There are currently 75 Red Coaters in this exclusive club.

One of the private suites at Arrowhead near the 50 yard line.  The suite rents for $300,000 per year without food and seats about 25 people.  There are outside seats available for the suite owners if they want to join the throbbing masses of ordinary fans in the stadium.

The Hunt family, owners of the Chiefs franchise, have a 4,000 sqft, two story suite in the stadium.  Nice.

The view from the suite.

Another indoors food service area are similar to the Arrowhead Club.

A nice fireplace for a cold day but you have to share with 80,000 others.  This fireplace is just one of many in the stadium.

The food service equipment was so impressive that I had to take a photo.

The Chiefs organization has always been a large contributor to a kinds of community activities in the Kansas City area.  The players all get involved in one form or another.

Past Chiefs players who won the NFL Man of the Year award.

On the field....but you can't walk on the grass.

The Chiefs dressing room.

Jamaal Charles' locker.  Jamaal is out for the 2015 season with a knee injury.  He is on track to be the best running back in NFL history.

Sigrid at Alex Smith's locker all dressed out for the game.

You don't step on the arrowhead in the carpet.....hallowed ground in the locker room.

The Kansas City Chiefs Hall of Honor.  I have watched every one of these past great players while they were in their prime going back to 1963.

The NFL championship trophy from Super Bowl IV.

After the tour, we all gathered at V's Italian Restaurant for get warmed up and have some great food in our own private room.