Family Opening Day set at Albany Museum of Art

ALBANY ─ Families can engage in art-centered fun while enjoying the four new fall exhibitions at the Albany Museum of Art. Family Opening Day is planned for 10 a.m.-1 p.m. on Saturday. The event is free and open to the public.

“Families can see the four new exhibitions that open on Aug. 29 and engage in fun activities,” AMA Director of Education and Public Programming Annie Vanoteghem said. “Kids can win a prize for completing a scavenger hunt in the galleries, and make a take-home art project in the AMA Classroom. It’s a good way to get out of the August heat and enjoy some cool art fun.”

The day of family adventure is an excellent opportunity to acquaint children and youths with the work of two talented Southern artists, AMA officials said.

David Lanier of Albany is an internationally renowned painter specializing in sporting art, dogs, birds and landscapes. His Haley Gallery exhibition “Beauty in the Humble Places” is a retrospective of his three decades as a professional artist, his early career as an illustrator, and his formative work at Ringling College of Art and Design in Sarasota, Fla.

In the East Gallery, “Rootwork” features recent works by Jillian Marie Browning, an artist and an assistant professor of photography at the University of Alabama at Birmingham. Browning’s work combines photography and materials to explore the black Southern experience. The Florida native’s AMA exhibition presents works that create intersections between black hair practices and culture with botany and vegetation.

An exhibition celebrating the first six decades of the Albany Museum of Art will be on view in the upstairs McCormack Gallery. “Sixty years of Masterpieces and Memories” feature artworks from the AMA permanent collection that have been selected to highlight the many donors who helped to launch the museum.

In the Hodges Gallery will be the final iteration of the yearlong exhibition “Old Master Drawings.” The works were selected from 150 drawings from the 15th to 18th centuries donated to the AMA in 1988 by Randolph Shaffer Jr. Shaffer collected the drawings while serving in the U.S. military in Europe during World War II.

The four exhibitions will continue through Jan. 4. The AMA, located at 311 Meadowlark Drive, is open 10 a.m.-5 p.m. Tuesdays through Saturdays. Admission is free for everyone. For information, visit the AMA website www.albanymuseum.com.

Special Photo: Albany Museum of Art