Artists & Art Enthusiasts
We are the catalyst for contemporary art in Tulsa, providing a platform for evolving ideas and aesthetics, interdisciplinarity, and community empowerment through exhibitions, workshops, performances, films, lectures, and education.
Timeline
History of Living Arts
The 1970’s
Living Arts was founded In 1969 by a group of artists in six disciplines: Painting, Music, Literary Arts, Cinematography , Theater, and Sculpture.
The first director of Living Arts, Virginia Myers, was a teacher who tried to learn and teach from an experimental model. Living Arts enabled her to share her gifts with the community and develop the standard of committees we still have today.
The 1980’s
The 1980s are an extraordinary period of growth and development for Living Arts.
The breadth of work Living Arts was bringing to Tulsa was stunning; John Cage, Joseph Celli, Pauline Oliveros, Robert Bly, and Joan Joanas—all significant figures in the world arena of contemporary performance, poetry, dance, and music.
The 1990’s
In 1991, Virginia Myers passes away and Steve Liggett becomes the new Director of Living Arts.
A ceremony was held to honor Virginia Myers’ life and the current Myers Gallery was named in her honor. Steve carried on the principles of the original founders who came before him and fashioned Living Arts in the mold of an arts organization defined by its mission but firmly embedded in our community.
The 2000’s
Living Arts truly becomes a platform for emerging artists to explore contemporary art practices.
The emphasis for exhibitions became showing works that contained social or political commentary that pushed both artists and the audience to engage in an experience beyond the traditional gallery setting. Giving the Tulsa community “art that makes you talk” became an important responsibility of Living Arts. Performance art stayed at the forefront of programming as we continued to grow.
The 2010’s
Living Arts continues to grow, debuting programming that we still offer to this day.
Over the next decade, our programming continued to grow into our current lineup
of the New Genre Arts Festival, Spoken Word Events, Champagne & Chocolate
Gala, the Dia de los Muertos Arts Festival, Art Car Weekend, and more!
The 2020’s
In 2020 Heather Duncan becomes the Executive Director as we enter the COVID Pandemic.
Spring of 2020 brought new challenges for how the community would engage in our programming. A new hybrid model was developed that has allowed our artists, staff, and community to stay safe, but also keep our doors open.
Who We Are
Meet the Team
Heather Duncan
Executive Director
Chris Henson
Events & Facilities Manager
Jessica Dewey
Program and Development Director
Laura Ruiz
Project Coordinator
Anne Faust
Gallery Coordinator
Jordyn Winett
Communications Coordinator
Board Members at Large
2021-2022 Board of Directors
Nora Miller, Torii Ransome Freeman, Joe Franco, TJ Warren, Dana Birkes, David Broome, Ebony Easiley, Kelcy Flores, Tina Henley, Mery McNett, Mary Beth Nesser, Lucia Carbello Oberle, Merritt Wakefield.
Ranan Gangel
President
Tony Balenti
Treasurer
Derek Ball
Secretary
Grants & Funders
Thank You For Supporting The Arts
In Memory of Jane and Bob Price
Myra Block
Gerald H. Westby,
Jr. Foundation
Kathleen P.
Westby Foundation
Jill Pinkerton
Piper & Callum Raffel
Johnny and Kelly Rhodes
The Collaborative
Archives
Coming in 2023! We’re excited to announce we are working on creating a digital archive of our work–-and it’s a monumental endeavor! Until the digital archives are ready, please call us at (918) 585-1234 or send us an email with specific archive questions.
