Press Room --

Illinois State Museum Exhibition Extended — L. Brent Kington: Mythic Metalsmith

50 years of Metalwork by Renowned Southern Illinois Artist

Exhibition to close January 12, 2011

Springfield IL - The Illinois State Museum has extended the current gallery exhibition, L. Brent Kington: Mythic Metalsmith, through January 12, 2011. This retrospective exhibition spans 50 years of metal work by a southern Illinois artist who has had a profound impact on the worlds of metalsmithing and blacksmithing. L. Brent Kington, recognized as pioneering the resurgence of blacksmithing as an American art form, is one of thirty-nine people in the United States to receive the American Craft Council’s “Gold Medal,” the Council’s highest award to individual artists.

The exhibition features sculpture borrowed from private and museum collections and includes cast silver and bronze toys from the early 1960s. Pivotal works of forged iron and steel show how Kington transitioned into blacksmithing with a series of whimsical forged iron weathervanes and the brilliant Icarus series. These works led to his most recent abstract sculptures with crosiers, spires, and crescents.

Recent enhancements to the exhibition include the addition of “For the Young @ Art” labels at kids’ height that encourage families to explore and learn together through engaging questions and fun facts and a SCVNGR (pronounced “scavenger”) trek. SCVNGR can be played on any phone via text messaging, or with the SCVNGR application on iPhone or Android. The “Mythic Metalsmith” trek asks players to answer questions about the exhibition to earn points.

The January 12, 2011 Paul F. Mickey Science Series lecture, at 7:00 p.m. in the Thorne Deuel Auditorium on the lower level of the Museum, is the finale to the L. Brent Kington: Mythic Metalsmith exhibition. Dr. Jonathan E. Reyman, ISM Curator of Anthropology, will present “Heavy Metal: Brent Kington’s Toys and Akan Asante Goldweights.” Reyman will discuss some of the Asante influences on Kington’s toys in the context of a wider look at the Museum’s collection of goldweights, their history, and use among the Asante people. The Kington exhibition will be open before and after the presentation.

There is an online learning guide to the Kington exhibition at: www.museum.state.il.us/exhibits/brentkington/.

The exhibition catalog is available for purchase in the Museum Store or online: https://www.museum.state.il.us/publications/catalog_by_categories/32/0.

Major support for this exhibition has been provided by the Illinois Arts Council through the National Endowment for the Arts American Masterpieces Initiative.

For more information, contact Robert Sill, Illinois State Museum, at rsill@museum.state.il.us or (217) 524-5744.

The Illinois State Museum is located at 502 S. Spring Street (the corner of Spring and Edwards Streets) in Springfield, and is open 8:30 a.m. to 5:00 p.m. Monday through Saturday, noon to 5:00 p.m. Sunday.  Admission is free.  Parking is available nearby and the building is ADA accessible.