INDIANA UNIVERSITY PURDUE UNIVERSITY INDIANAPOLIS

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CULTURAL IMAGES BY HOOSIER ARTISTS JUST A CLICK AWAY

Cultural images by Hoosier artists will only be a mouse click away thanks to the IUPUI University Library and the Indianapolis Museum of Art Community Project.

After first putting the world of art at the fingertips of central Indiana teachers and library patrons, the IUPUI University Library and the Indianapolis Museum of Art Community Project has turned to the Johnson County Library to begin making the work of Hoosier artists like William Forsyth available to anyone, anytime, anywhere.

The IUPUI University Library and Museums Community Project, the only one of its kind in the nation, has already digitized 10 works by Forsyth, Cecil Head and other Hoosier artists whose original paintings are held by the Johnson County Public Library.

With just the click of a mouse, these rich, colorful paintings that capture the essence of Indiana can be viewed in their entirety or so close-up that only a portion of the work fills the computer screen.

Among the images is Beulah Mae Mardis's painting for the cover of the book "Franklin - a Pictorial History," two landscapes by Forsyth, Head's painting "Indiana Potato Planters," and Maxine Lain's painting "Water From the Spring."

The images may be viewed at www.ulib.iupui.edu/imls/home.html, and clicking on Hoosier Artists Project.

Cultural images the IUPUI University Library Community Project staff hopes to add to the web site include Works Progress Administration (WPA) murals painted by artists in central Indiana during the depression.

Funded with a $290,000 National Leadership grant from the Institute of Museum and Library Services in 1998, the IUPUI Project has provided free access to thousands of art images and related text on line in two commercial art databases for public and private schools, as well as public libraries in a nine-county central Indiana area.

The Institute of Museum and Library Services is a federal agency that fosters innovation, leadership, and a lifetime of learning.

Generally, the databases cost too much for individual schools and small public libraries to purchase access to the images. Even with the grant, the cost of the databases required the project to limit access to them to a nine-county area.

The Indianapolis Museum of Art joined IUPUI University Library as the main supporting partner on the Community Project that was designed to enrich the lives of people in central Indiana through visual arts. The project offered an opportunity for public and private schools and public libraries to come together in a unique library/museum partnership. Other museum supporters of the Community Project are the Eiteljorg Museum of American Indians and Western Art, the Indiana State Museum, the Children 's Museum, and the Indiana Historical Society.

"Art is connected to all areas of learning and is the foundation for creating and understanding culture," said Sonja Staum-Kuniej, Project Director. "Whether it is a student or a lifelong learner, the arts give quality and meaning to our lives and are essential to understanding who we are."

Staum-Kuniej said the latest phase of the project will do for anyone with a computer what the initial phases of the project have already done for students and library patrons in central Indiana: invite them to explore the great cultural treasures Indiana has to offer.

With the staff of the Johnson County Public Library serving as advisors to the project, Staum-Kuniej said the project turned to it to obtain the first digitized images of Hoosier cultural images.

The effort has intrigued Franklin High School art teacher Kelli DeMott Park, whose students will add some of the paintings that are digitized on the web site to the school's "museum," a process in which a painting is copied by the students onto a school hall. The new art works will join other famous art images the students have added to the school's art museum in recent years.

Elementary and secondary school lesson plans have already been developed for the Hoosier Artists section of the website to assist teachers in bringing art into the classroom in a manner that allows it to be incorporated into different classes such as social studies, language arts and science.

For more information about the project, please contact Sonja Staum-Kuniej, at (317) 920-2432 or by email at sstaumku@iupui.edu.

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