Louisville Magazine

JUL 2017

Louisville Magazine is Louisville's city magazine, covering Louisville people, lifestyles, politics, sports, restaurants, entertainment and homes. Includes a monthly calendar of events.

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LOUISVILLE MAGAZINE 7.17 91 Museum staff make "Southern Accent" sound like a warm-up for what's to come. Next year the museum will dedicate a sizable portion of programming to women-related shows. "is museum was founded by a woman," Reily says, referring to Hattie Bish- op Speed, "and our endowment is more or less the generosity of her granddaughter, Al- ice Speed Stoll." "Women Artists in the Age of Impressionism" is one such show, coming next February. However, with potential cuts to the National Endowment for the Arts, the Speed may not be able to continue showcas- ing traveling exhbits such as this. As opposed to only bringing in traveling exhibits and rotating pieces from the Speed's own collection, the self-generated exhibition, like Lash's "Southern Accent," is something Courier-Journal arts writer Elizabeth Kramer says she's seen museums around the country starting to do. Beyond the art museum being a showcase, it's a producer. Lash has plans for more collaborations, including a project on compassion. Kramer mentions what film curator Dean Otto has been doing — such as screening the Civil War film Men Go to Bat- tle, which was shot and set in Kentucky and won director Zachary Treitz an award at the Tribeca Film Festival. Demand to see Men Go to Battle was so high that the film went to Village 8 following several sold-old shows at the Speed. "at kind of specialness makes it personal and local," Kramer says. More than a year after the museum's reopening following a three-and-a-half- year, $60-million renovation and expansion, it still feels new. Employees and board members like to say that the Speed is both 90 years old and one year old, an acknowl- edgement meant to treat the museum both as a legacy and a start-up. Earlier this year, Ghislain d'Humières re- signed as director to be with his aging father in France. Reily, a prominent local business- man, took over as interim director in April, promising to stay on for 18 months as the board searches for a permanent replacement. "Ghislain was the right person at the right time to get us open on time and on budget with flair and enthusiasm," board president Martha Slaughter says. "Stephen is a suc- cessful entrepreneur looking at the museum financially. I think we're running a lot more efficiently. We're still learning how to live in that building." Having been closed for so long, the level of staff needed was sort of an unknown, leading to layoffs, and the days and hours open to the public have also taken some adjusting. Reily says he and his team are considering staying open later on Friday nights and are trying to figure out how to use the new spaces, including the cinema, for different events and lectures. A recent report shows that this first year since reopening brought in 130,000 people — about 75 percent more visitors than any of the three years prior to the mu- seum's closing. It also reveals the popularity of Owsley Sundays, when admission is free, a gift from Brown-Forman Corp. "e main thing I've learned is literally how much everyone who works here wants to work at a museum," Reily says. "I had coffee a few weeks ago with 15 security guards and almost every one of them is a practicing artist on the side. It means a lot to be around art."

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