Community Calendar

"Discovering Ansel Adams" features over 100 photographs that share Adams’s most celebrated works while revealing aspects of his development that are frequently overlooked. Together with original archival materials from the Center of Creative Photography’s Ansel Adams Archive, these photographs demonstrate how Adams transformed from a fourteen-year-old tourist with a camera into a renowned photographer between 1916 and the 1940s. Along the way, photographic prints from his early visits to the American Southwest, his mountaineering experiences as a young man, and his quest to photograph America’s national parks will enchant visitors.

Oklahoma Contemporary presents the first major retrospective of Oklahoma City-based artist Edgar Heap of Birds, who is known internationally for conceptual artwork that addresses Indigenous rights, sovereignty and relationships to place. Hock E Aye Vi Edgar Heap of Birds: HONOR SONG is a landmark for American art, for the region and for the city: the artist’s first institutional survey in his home-state of the last forty years. The exhibition spans over four decades of art production, tracing Heap of Birds’ trajectory from the 1970s to the present through colorful prints, abstract paintings, drawings, glassworks, sculptures and public works.

For more information: 405-951-0000, okcontemp.org/honorsong

Image: Edgar Heap of Birds, Neuf, 1995. The John and Susan Horseman Collection, Courtesy of the Horseman Foundation. © Edgar Heap of Birds. Image courtesy of the artist.

Museum Films presents the annual curated program of the best of new and classic French cinema, presented with support from Alliance Française of Oklahoma City (afdokc.org). French Film in July features six new French films, including the delightful literary romance “Jane Austen Wrecked My Life," which screens July 25-27, and a three-film retrospective of rarely seen bohemian seaside vacation idylls from French New Wave director Jacques Rozier screening Thursdays, July 10, 17, and 24.

Step into a world of vibrant imagination with A Colorful Dream, an interactive exhibition by contemporary fine art photographer Adrien Broom. This family-friendly experience follows a young girl’s journey through a series of monochromatic fantasy worlds, each meticulously crafted to explore the emotions and symbolism of the full spectrum of the rainbow. Broom’s large-scale photographs, created without digital manipulation, capture the magic of these handmade sets, bringing fairy-tale-like landscapes to life.

Exclusive to the Fred Jones Jr. Museum of Art, the exhibition features a site-specific installation that reimagines black not as an absence, but as the presence of all colors. This striking addition invites viewers to contemplate color in a new way, blending fantasy and reality in stunning detail.

She Kills Monsters tells the story of Agnes Evans as she leaves her childhood home in Ohio following the death of her teenage sister, Tilly. When Agnes finds Tilly’s Dungeons & Dragons notebook, however, she finds herself catapulted into a journey of discovery and action-packed adventure in the imaginary world that was her sister’s refuge. In this high-octane dramatic comedy laden with homicidal fairies, nasty ogres, and 90s pop culture, acclaimed playwright Qui Nguyen offers a heart-pounding homage to the geek and warrior within us all.

Join us this summer at the Sam Noble Museum and experience science first-hand through a variety of discovery-based programs. Each week-long, two-hour Summer Explorers program (children ages 6-7, 8-9, and 10-12) features a different natural or cultural history theme.

REGISTRATION
Don’t miss out! Space is limited and advance registration is required. Visit the Sam Noble Museum website to register. For questions or accommodations on the basis of disability, please contact Visitor Services at (405) 325-7977. Cost: $80 (Member youth); $100 (Non-member youth).

Required program forms will be sent via confirmation email.

ROBERTA PAILES FUND FOR CHILDREN’S PROGRAMS
A limited number of program fees can be funded for families who demonstrate financial need. Click Here for more information and to apply.

T-SHIRT
Each Summer Explorers youth program participant will receive a T-shirt. Please indicate the size when you register.

OFF-SITE PROGRAMS indicated with ☀️
These programs will take place in the best classroom of all: the great outdoors! We will start at the museum and then travel in museum or university vans to local parks. Booster seats are provided for children 9 and under and are available for children over the age of 9 upon request of parents/guardians. Participants should be dressed to get wet and dirty and must bring a water bottle.

Unbroken Spirit: Holocaust Resistance, Rescue, Resilience

The many examples of armed and unarmed resistance in the ghettos and death camps refute the persistent yet false assertions that the Jews did not resist, but simply walked to the gas chambers “like sheep to the slaughter.” Resistance took many forms.

Please join us summer 2025 for the Eva Unterman Conferences for Holocaust Education, sponsored by the Oklahoma Holocaust Legislation Coalition to explore questions such as: What forms did resistance take? Who fought for Jewish honor and to avenge the slaughter of so many innocent victims? These and other questions will be answered when we gather for a day of learning in June and July of 2025.

State Holocaust experts will present experience-based, classroom-ready lessons. Social Studies, ELA and Visual Arts teachers will receive 7 Professional Development credits and instruction specific to their disciplines at our FREE conferences. Breakfast and lunch provided.

*By registering for this event, you grant SB1671 permission to capture your image and likeness in photographs or video recordings taken during the event. You acknowledge and agree that these images may be used for promotional and marketing purposes, including but not limited to social media, event websites, and other public-facing materials, without any compensation or additional consent.

"Discovering Ansel Adams" features over 100 photographs that share Adams’s most celebrated works while revealing aspects of his development that are frequently overlooked. Together with original archival materials from the Center of Creative Photography’s Ansel Adams Archive, these photographs demonstrate how Adams transformed from a fourteen-year-old tourist with a camera into a renowned photographer between 1916 and the 1940s. Along the way, photographic prints from his early visits to the American Southwest, his mountaineering experiences as a young man, and his quest to photograph America’s national parks will enchant visitors.

Oklahoma Contemporary presents the first major retrospective of Oklahoma City-based artist Edgar Heap of Birds, who is known internationally for conceptual artwork that addresses Indigenous rights, sovereignty and relationships to place. Hock E Aye Vi Edgar Heap of Birds: HONOR SONG is a landmark for American art, for the region and for the city: the artist’s first institutional survey in his home-state of the last forty years. The exhibition spans over four decades of art production, tracing Heap of Birds’ trajectory from the 1970s to the present through colorful prints, abstract paintings, drawings, glassworks, sculptures and public works.

For more information: 405-951-0000, okcontemp.org/honorsong

Image: Edgar Heap of Birds, Neuf, 1995. The John and Susan Horseman Collection, Courtesy of the Horseman Foundation. © Edgar Heap of Birds. Image courtesy of the artist.

Don Holliday, long time Norman attorney will be speaking about the judicial system and the division between the three branches of government. The focus will be on how to best support the judiciary.