Entrance to the symposium is free and pre-registration is not required. Those who attend will be invited to register on site when they arrive.
All presenters are found in the Full Conference Program.
This exhibit highlights the work of Ozarks people responding to a need. They picked up rocks to clear the land; the rock was free and was useful in making homes, barns, schools, churches and business buildings. Many were built between the 1920s-1940s, with sensitivity to the selection of rocks and placement, often adding interesting embellishments. These buildings held mothers and babies, grandpas and grandmas, through good times and bad times.
Recently the term “giraffe rock” has become popular, referring to a particular style of rock building. These are multicolored earth-toned field stone or slab rock, separated by raised beaded mortar which is sometimes painted white resembling the pattern seen on a giraffe. This is the Ozarks’ unique contribution to American architecture.
During the 1930s President Franklin D. Roosevelt’s Works Progress Administration meant to put people to work and used local rock for public projects. The WPA created jobs in the Ozarks, but the agency could also be controversial among Ozarkers.
Examples of WPA built rock schools in this exhibit are scattered throughout the seven-county area of this research project. Included here are examples of one-room, two-room and two-story structures: Lost Pond, Oregon County; Wilderness, Oregon County; Blackjack, Douglas County; Boatman’s, Howell County; Couch, Oregon County.
Reflection on buildings as containers of spirit came after a recent trip to Turkey to see Hagia Sophia, a 1500-year-old structure built in the 6th century. It continues to emanate a powerful and peaceful spirit. Buildings have the potential to retain the spirit of those that built and/or occupied them.
Barbara Williams was born and raised in the Missouri Ozarks and earned art degrees from Southwest Missouri State University and Southern Illinois University, graduating with an MFA. After graduation she spent one year traveling and working in Europe, visiting countries of her favorite artists. In 1997 she returned to Europe, taking a class in monotype printmaking in Florence, Italy.
Her work has been included in international juried printmaking exhibitions in England, Italy, Poland, Yugoslavia, and numerous juried national and regional shows in the U.S., including one held at the Smithsonian Institution, which was also included in a year-long traveling exhibit. Williams’s prints and mixed media collage paintings are included in permanent collections in Little Rock, AR (Arkansas Museum of Fine Arts); Boulder, CO; Swannanoa, NC (Swannanoa College) and in private collections in the U.S. and Italy. In addition, her work has been featured in four Watercolor USA (Springfield, MO) exhibits. Influenced by impressions from an Ozarks 1940s-50s childhood, the prints and mixed media paintings are personal expressions and help preserve the history of that time and place.
Williams served as adjunct art faculty for 30 years at Missouri State University-West Plains.
Refreshments will be served, and the artist will be available to discuss her work.
Swindler. Murderer. Scoundrel. Robert Boatright was one of Middle America’s greatest confidence men. Although little remembered today, his story provides a rare glimpse into Middle America’s criminal past. Working in concert with a local bank and an influential Democratic boss in Jasper County, Missouri, 'this dean of modern confidence men' and his colorful confederacy of con men known as the Buckfoot Gang seemed untouchable. A series of missteps, however, led to a string of court cases across the country that brought Boatright’s own criminal enterprise to an end. And yet, the con continued: Boatright’s successor, John C. Mabray, and his cronies, many of whom had been in the Buckfoot Gang, preyed upon victims across North America in one of the largest midwestern criminal syndicates in history before they were brought to heel. Like the works of Sinclair Lewis, Boatright’s story exposes a rift in the wholesome midwestern stereotype and furthers our understanding of nineteenth- and twentieth-century American society.
A native of McDonald County, Missouri, Kimberly Harper earned degrees in history from Crowder College, Missouri Southern State University, and the University of Arkansas. In 2011 she received the Missouri Humanities Council’s Distinguished Achievement in Literature (Non-Fiction) Award for her book White Man’s Heaven: The Lynching and Expulsion of Blacks in the Southern Ozarks, 1894–1909, which was published by the University of Arkansas Press. The keynote is based on her most recent book, Men of No Reputation: Robert Boatright, the Buckfoot Gang, and the Fleecing of Middle America (University of Arkansas Press, 2024).
2024 FULL PROGRAM (PDF 412 KB)
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