The K-State Student Union has a rich history in private art. Since its inception, the Union has been acquiring artwork to add to its permanent art collection on display throughout the building. Along with the major displays, including the Chinese Warrior and Red Skelton exhibits and the William T. Kemper Art Gallery, the Union houses many other beautiful, though less well-known pieces of artwork. The east wing of the Union features mainly Kansas artists including several works by former KSU faculty. The south-west wing focuses primarily on ethnic artists, incorporating pieces from many countries and different cultures. Prior to its relocation to the Marianna Kistler Beach Museum of Art, the Union was home to the extensive University Art Collection. The next time you’re at the Union, take a moment to explore some of these incredible art exhibits.
The William T. Kemper Art Gallery is the premier venue for art exhibits, showcasing
KSU students, faculty, and guest artists all year round. The Kemper Art Gallery is scheduled by Union Program Council and is located on the first floor of the Union.
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The Union has added two new pieces to its collection: “Chautaugun County Sunrise” by Stan Herd and, most recently, a striking sculpture from Yoshiro Ikeda. Yoshiro is currently the head of the ceramics department at Kansas State University. He has served as an instructor, visiting artist and juror, and has received numerous national and international awards during his 30 years of working as a ceramic artist. Yoshiro earned an undergraduate and graduate degree in the United States, but also was trained in the traditions and philosophy of Japanese ceramics. It is Yoshiro’s goal to achieve complex rich surfaces through multiple firings in the electric kiln. The sculpture can now be viewed in the Cat’s Pause Lounge.
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In 2001, the K-State Student Union received an impressive new addition to its permanent art collection. The Norman Brandeberry family graciously donated a rare replica sculpture of an ancient Chinese warrior which dates back to the Qin Shi Huang dynasty (259-210
BC).
In 1974, archaeologists working in China uncovered one of the major discoveries of the century — the attendant burial pits of Qin Shi Huang, China’s first feudal emperor. Over 8,000 unique, life-sized, armored Terra Cotta warriors and more than 100 chariots were found in a rectangular military formation.
Part of China’s national treasury, and considered the “Eighth Wonder of the World,” a limited number of replicas have been authorized and created for private collections. The K-State Student Union’s statue is number 14, while former President Clinton owns number 17.
The warrior sculpture is part of a special, permanent Union exhibit, located north of the middle stairs on the ground floor. History professor David Graff assisted in developing materials for the exhibit. The statue was officially dedicated in 2002 as part of the Union Program Council’s Festival of Nations.
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France, a center of liberalism for decades, was deeply affected by a new anti-Semitism that arose in Europe in the middle of the 19th century. The Dreyfus Affair was a culmination of this long period of anti-Semitic agitation coupled with ideological and political struggles.
Army Captain Alfred Dreyfus was accused of selling military secrets to the Germans, hurriedly court-martialed in a travesty of legal procedures and perversion of justice, branded a traitor to France, and sentenced to a lifetime of penal servitude on Devil’s Island. As France applauded the apprehension and punishment of a traitor, the reactionaries, led by popular anti-Semite Edouard Drumont, pounced on this as proof of what they had continually claimed: the traitorous Jews were dominating, corrupting, and destroying the life of France. As the story unfolded, the plot thickened and the cast of characters multiplied. The incident took on extraordinary ramifications with the media playing a powerful central role in trumpeting the anti-Jewish stereotype and whipping up hatred toward Dreyfus and all Jews.
While Dreyfus’s eventual vindication, 12 years after his initial arrest and conviction — resulting from the moral courage of French writer Èmile Zola and unprecedented international solidary on behalf of Dreyfus — halted official anti-Semitism, the years of propaganda against the Jews inevitably increased hostility toward them.
Mark Twain, who followed the case closely while living in Europe in the late 1890s, even compared Èmile Zola to Joan of Arc, a high compliment from the American writer. “Ecclesiastical and military courts made up of cowards, hypocrites and time-servers can be bred at a rate of a million a year,” he wrote, “but it takes five centuries to breed a Joan of Arc and a Zola.”
In the end, the lessons of the 100-year-old Dreyfus Affair are as relevant today as they were a century ago. Located in Forum Hall Lobby Gallery.
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Born in Bato-machi, Japan, Mitsugi Ohno began his career as a glassblower in 1947 at the University of Tokyo’s Department of Chemistry. He joined Kansas State University in 1961 and retired as Senior Master Glassblower in June 1996.
Professor Ohno achieved recognition nationally and internationally for his highly prized and artistic glass creations. His unique glass vessels, art objects, and replicas of famous buildings and ships have been donated to and displayed in such prestigious locations as the Smithsonian Institution, White House, Imperial Palace of Japan, National Archives, Eisenhower Presidential Library, and Kansas State University. He is the author of 12 monographs, textbooks, and papers, and has been honored with several awards and citations, including the State of Kansas Governor’s Special Lifetime Arts Recognition Award, the Yoshikawa Eiji Prize for Cultural Merit, and the Fifth Order of Merit, Order of the Rising Sun, Gold and Silver Rays — a very special honor from the Emperor of Japan.
In addition to Anderson Hall, Cardwell Hall, the
U.S.S. Nimitz, the
U.S.S. Missouri, and the White House (on display on the second floor of the Union), there are a number of historic glass ship models on display in the first floor lobby of the Chemistry/Biochemistry Building, including the Nina, Pinta, and Santa Maria, the Mayflower, the
U.S.S. Constitution, and the
H.M.S. Victory.
Mitsugi Ohno died on October 22, 1999, having nearly completed his last model of the Japanese sailing vessel, Kanrin Maru, which is in the display case that includes his bust and other personal items.
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Red Skelton, a renowned comedian and performer, was born in 1913 to a former circus clown and a cleaning woman. At the age of 10, he left home to travel the Midwest in a medicine show, and by 15 he joined the vaudeville circuit.
At the age of 17, he married Edna Marie Stilwell, an usher and later his chief writer and manager.
Skelton debuted on Broadway and in radio in 1937 and on film in 1938. During the 1930s, 1940s, 1950s, he appeared in numerous movies, including “I Dood It,” “A Southern Yankee,” and “DuBarry was a Lady.”
In 1951, his ex-wife/manager negotiated a seven-year Hollywood contract for him. Later that year, his famed show, “The Red Skelton Show,” premiered on
NBC. The show regularly stayed in the top 20, both on
NBC and
CBS.
The show featured characters such as Clem Kaddiddlehopper, George Appleby, and seagulls Gertrude and Heathcliffe, who delighted audiences for decades.
Red Skelton was a man of many talents. He is known not only for his roles on television and in the movies, but also for writing children’s books, performing as a clown, composing music, and painting clowns.
While visiting Kansas State University for a performance on Sept. 17, 1977, Skelton autographed several of his paintings, now hanging in this gallery. While at K-State, Skelton visited several classes and attended the K-State vs. Florida State football game.
Skelton died Sept. 17, 1997 at the age of 84, after a lingering illness. His sense of humor lives on in his work. Located in Forum Hall Lobby Gallery.
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The K-State Student Union proudly celebrates jazz by playing it as background music in parts of the Union. Jazz is unique in that it truly represents the only indigenous American art form in our culture. Jazz alone fully captures the free spirit of life that is our country’s legacy, and it is through the art of both spontaneous and extemporaneous improvisation that jazz has established and maintained international renown that it currently enjoys. Jazz is appropriately recognized throughout the world as our nation’s greatest badge of honor. Jazz is more than music–it is a way of life.
For additional information about jazz at K-State contact Dr. Wayne Goins, Director of Jazz, Associate Professor of Music at 785.532.3822 or weg@k-state.edu.
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