Farmers Weekly Review

The Joliet Public Library is proud to announce our partnership with the College of DuPage’s McAninch Arts Center to bring the “Elements of Timeless: Frida Kahlo” exhibit from September 17-October 16 to the Ottawa Street Branch in downtown Joliet. The exhibit is sponsored by Old National Bank.

Elements of Timeless refers to the “Timeless” exhibit that has been on display at the College of DuPage’s Cleve Carney Museum of Art in the McAninch Arts Center.

“We are proud to feature yet another outstanding exhibit here at the Library,” said Megan Millen, Executive Director of the Joliet Public Library, in a press release. “Bringing elements of the “Timeless” exhibit to Joliet celebrates history and art, and we hope to share that with our community.”

Although the exhibit will not feature original artwork, it will feature recreations of Frida’s bed, dresses, corsets, and a model of Frida’s blue house, all on loan from the McAninch Arts Center. There will also be a children’s area to encourage artwork, learning and play.

The Library invites the community to attend the opening night of the exhibit on Sunday, Sept. 17, from 2-4 p.m. Guest speaker Diana Martinez, Director of the McAninch Arts Center at the College of DuPage, will share her experiences researching and creating the exhibit.

There will also be a performance by Mariachi de Joliet, a 40 piece mariachi band, and food for sale by the Sunshine Mexican Cafe taco truck. A scavenger hunt will be available for all ages to participate in. The first 50 people to successfully complete the scavenger hunt will receive a coupon for free ice cream from the ice cream cart at the event.

Presented by the Cleve Carney Museum of Art and the McAninch Arts Center at the College of DuPage in Glen Ellyn, “Frida Kahlo Timeless” was a comprehensive presentation of the life and works of the artist Frida Kahlo that featured 26 original pieces as well as an immersive historical exhibit that provided a framework of the life, circumstances and events that led to Kahlo becoming one of the most important painters of the 20th century and of our time.

“Timeless” considered the many elements at play in Kahlo’s work. The complexities of Kahlo’s paintings can not be fully understood or appreciated without insight into her person and the world she was a part of.

Focused on the role Mexico City played in Kahlo’s development as a center of international art and culture in the early and middle 20th century, as well as Kahlo’s lifelong refusal to allow illness to restrict her diverse and intense passions.

Kahlo’s painting, politics, and identity were ahead of her time, and remain extremely relevant today. Kahlo explained that she “painted her reality”; this exhibition provided insight into that reality, while allowing more intimate access to her world.

For more information visit https://www.theccma.org/frida-kahlo-timeless.