The Newcomb Art Museum has received a $500,000, three-year grant from The Andrew W. Mellon Foundation to establish three interrelated initiatives to make the museum more inclusive and accessible. The funding comes from the philanthropic foundation’s Art Museum Futures Fund, launched in 2020 as part of its emergency grantmaking in response to the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on arts and cultural institutions around the nation.

The Newcomb Art Museum will commemorate the life of the late Kim Boutte, a member of the Fi Yi Yi Mardi Gras Indian tribe and a longtime Sodexo employee at Tulane, through a portrait by New Orleans–based artist Brandan “BMike” Odums. The portrait, still being created, is in response to calls from the Tulane community to honor Boutte’s contribution to the cultural landscape of New Orleans and the connections she made with students.

Newcomb Art Museum’s latest show NOT SUPPOSED 2 BE HERE by visual artist Brandan “BMike” Odums opens Jan. 18, 2020. It is the first solo exhibition for Odums in a museum setting. The display, which features brand new site-specific installations, as well as past work, is part retrospective and part futurescape. Audiences will be able to envision and engage with the bold histories — and futures — that Odums’ work encapsulates.

The Poydras Corridor Sculpture Exhibition presented by the Helis Foundation features a sculpture by the late Ida Kohlmeyer (NC ’33, G ’56). The sculpture, Box of Artificial Flowers #6, is the largest sculpture Kohlmeyer created, standing at 17 feet tall and 14 feet wide. The Helis Foundation purchased the sculpture from a private collector in Chicago in 2018 and invested in the restoration of the piece. The sculpture now sits on the neutral ground of Poydras Street and Loyola Avenue.

“By restricting ballet to pure romance, the art form loses its power to make critical commentary on the state of things.” Felicia McCarren, professor of French and dance historian, said in a New York Times article, “Is Ballet Camp?”

School of Architecture faculty members Carrie Norman and Adam Modesitt, along with their students, created an intricate mural as a part of the “Unframed” project of the Arts Council of New Orleans. The project includes five murals within walking distance of each other in the city’s Arts District. The mural by Norman, Modesitt and their students is a life-size architectural drawing of a mid-19th century shotgun house called “Open House.” The project’s goal is to bring vibrancy to New Orleans outside of gallery walls and was funded by a $175,000 grant from the Helis Foundation.