Community Calendar

As we celebrate the future of shoes, it can be fascinating to look back to see where we have already been. During this ArtBreak talk, fashion historian and professor Iris Carney Cooper will offer an overview of notable and special shoe designs throughout time, discussing history, significance, function, and design.

Cooper is a fashion historian, currently teaching at Western Michigan University and managing the Historic Garment Collection. She received her BA in Fashion Design and Merchandising from Dominican University in River Forest, IL, and her Graduate Certificate in History from WMU.

All hybrid events will be livestreamed to our YouTube page and can be found under the “Live” tab. Recordings of select past events are available on YouTube as well.

The return of the ultimate glass blowing competition! Join us April 24 & 25 as the best glass blowers from Chicago, Detroit, Grand Rapids, Kalamazoo and beyond meet for head-to-head competitions in our hot shop and flame shop. Witness the thrilling action and cheer on your favorites as you cast your vote for who receives cash prizes, trophies, and bragging rights for the year.

This year’s theme is “Space Creatures”! The event will culminate with our Sketches to Sculptures competition, where glass blowing teams take children’s drawings of Space Creatures and blow them into 3D glass sculptures before our eyes.

This community event is FREE to attend and fun for ALL AGES. Save the dates and don’t miss it!

Glass Blowers Battle 2026
April 24 | 3-10pm
April 25 | 9-6pm
at Glass Art Kalamazoo - 326 W Kalamazoo Ave, Kalamazoo MI 49007

Learn more: https://glassartkalamazoo.org/glass-blowers-battle-2026/

The return of the ultimate glass blowing competition! Join us April 24 & 25 as the best glass blowers from Chicago, Detroit, Grand Rapids, Kalamazoo and beyond meet for head-to-head competitions in our hot shop and flame shop. Witness the thrilling action and cheer on your favorites as you cast your vote for who receives cash prizes, trophies, and bragging rights for the year.

This year’s theme is “Space Creatures”! The event will culminate with our Sketches to Sculptures competition, where glass blowing teams take children’s drawings of Space Creatures and blow them into 3D glass sculptures before our eyes.

This community event is FREE to attend and fun for ALL AGES. Save the dates and don’t miss it!

Glass Blowers Battle 2026
April 24 | 3-10pm
April 25 | 9-6pm
at Glass Art Kalamazoo - 326 W Kalamazoo Ave, Kalamazoo MI 49007

Learn more: https://glassartkalamazoo.org/glass-blowers-battle-2026/

The Kirk Newman Art School’s Post-Baccalaureate Program is designed for recent fine arts graduates seeking to grow and strengthen their creative practice in a supportive community with access to professional studio facilities. The culmination of the 2025–2026 resident artists’ work will be on display in the KNAS commons from May 1–31. This unique group exhibition will feature new works in Ceramics, Painting, Photography, Printmaking, and Sculpture from our seven residents.

The opening reception for this exhibition will coincide with Art Hop on Friday, May 1, from 5–8pm. Join us in celebrating the talents of these amazing emerging artists! Learn more about each Resident and their art making journey on our YouTube Virtual ArtBreak series.

The Residency application deadline for 2026–2027 is May 15, 2026.

Photo by Mary Whalen

Immerse yourself in shades of blue as we explore selected works from the exhibition From Cobalt to Indigo: The Power of Blue in East Asia, on view in the Joy Light Gallery through July 12. Together we will learn more about the cultural significance and wide-reaching influence of the color blue in the art of East Asia.

Please note that this event will not be livestreamed or posted on YouTube.
Gallery Gatherings are short, lightly-moderated conversations about selected artworks from ongoing exhibitions. Chairs and gallery stools are available for guests. This program is free, but preregistration is encouraged.

Explore the artwork of Edward Hopper in this lecture by Dr. James Denison, Postdoctoral Fellow at the Kalamazoo Institute of Arts and Kalamazoo College. Denison’s presentation will consider the use of fashion in Edward Hopper’s paintings of urban American life, interpreting his simplified representations of clothes as a strategy crucial to the sense of isolation and emotional restraint often associated with his work. Hopper’s paintings of the 1920’s, ’30s, and ’40s only represent a limited portion of the fashion landscape of the era, a potent choice given the widely held notion that his pictures thematize the psychological experience of modern life.

A native of the DC area and a graduate of Bowdoin College, James completed his PhD in art history at the University of Michigan, where he wrote a thesis on the connections between the Stieglitz Circle and racism in the interwar U.S. In 2023 he joined Kalamazoo College and the Kalamazoo Institute of Arts as a postdoctoral fellow.

All hybrid events will be livestreamed to our YouTube page and can be found under the “Live” tab. Recordings of select past events are available on YouTube as well.

In May, Art Detectives will be on the case, searching for how artists show people in their artwork. We’ll read a book about different artistic styles, hunt for faces and figures in the permanent collection, and finish by creating our own portrait masterpiece to take home. Arty will be on vacation in June, July, and August. Please join us again in September when Arty has returned.

Please note that this event will not be livestreamed or posted on YouTube.
Art Detectives is a free program for children 4-8 years old (but all ages are welcome). Join us as we read a story, look at art, and make a project to take home. Caregivers must stay with their children at all times. This is a free program; preregistration is encouraged. Adults, remember to register your children!

Join us for a special Artful Evening with Elizabeth Semmelhack, Director and Senior Curator of the Bata Shoe Museum in Toronto! Semmelhack is the curator of Future Now: Virtual Sneakers to Cutting-Edge Kicks. During this program, she will talk about why shoes matter and about how designers today are revolutionizing what we will put on our feet tomorrow. If you’ve enjoyed Future Now, don’t miss this opportunity to meet the curator behind the exhibition!

Semmelhack’s work focuses on the intersections of fashion, culture, and economics, with a particular interest in the history of footwear. She is widely quoted in the media from the New York Times to Vogue, and since starting at the Bata Shoe Museum in 2000, she has curated over thirty exhibitions and written fourteen books and catalogues and over thirty chapters and articles. Her most recent exhibitions and publications related to sneakers include Art/Wear: Sneakers x Artists (2024), Future Now: Virtual Sneakers to Cutting-Edge Kicks (Rizzoli:2022), Collab: Sneakers x Culture (Rizzoli: 2019), and Out of the Box: The Rise of Sneaker Culture (Rizzoli: 2015).

Future Now: Virtual Sneakers to Cutting-Edge Kicks is co-organized by the American Federation of Arts and the Bata Shoe Museum, and curated by Elizabeth Semmelhack, Director and Senior Curator of the Bata Shoe Museum.

All hybrid events will be livestreamed to our YouTube page and can be found under the “Live” tab. Recordings of select past events are available on YouTube as well.

Saturday, May 16, 10 am – Noon
Meet: Auditorium

Steve Brown of Kalamazoo is a poet who writes with “the eye of a reporter, the touch of a painter and the heart of a storyteller.”

Steve will be reading from his latest book, News of Need (2025), capturing more than 40 portraits of people and natural landscapes that have been left out, looked over, or worked to the bone, but not without the hope of revelation or redemption.

Steve has staged his work internationally, been awarded residencies at the Sitka Center for Art and Ecology and has been nominated for two Pushcart Prizes. Since 2016 Brown has been co-founding and leading a foundation in Kalamazoo, Michigan. His books will be available for purchase during the event.

Fee: Included in regular KNC admission; KNC Members free! Drop in program.

Inspired by the innovation and history of sneakers, we will provide origami paper to fold your own mini shoe! A variety of styles and difficulty levels will be provided. Check out the exhibition Future Now: Virtual Sneakers to Cutting-Edge Kicks for inspiration and then drop by the library to try your hand at this detailed paper project.

Future Now: Virtual Sneakers to Cutting-Edge Kicks is co-organized by the American Federation of Arts and the Bata Shoe Museum, and curated by Elizabeth Semmelhack, Director and Senior Curator of the Bata Shoe Museum.

Please note that this event will not be livestreamed or posted on YouTube.