Beyond Their Wildest
Dreams! SAA Members Reflect On Their
Historic Ongoing Tour of Paintings
Exquisite Miniatures by Wes
& Rachelle Siegrist
Artists dream of their work being seen outside of family and
aspire to participate in public shows.
Juried exhibitions and galleries are considered a step up that ladder to
success. Inclusion into anything inside
museums carries an added aura of success that might culminate into the dream of
one day walking into a museum and seeing one’s own work filling an exhibition
hall. Few artists achieve this while they’re living and even less do it while
they are young in both years and career.
It happened to us! We knew we had made history. To our knowledge, only a few living miniature
painters had ever been featured in a solo museum exhibition and none to the
scale achieved for us by our tour director.
That momentous start, back in 2010, exploded into the most successful
touring exhibition of miniature paintings by living artists in history and it’s
still going and growing!
The Siegrists with Dr. David
J. Wagner, EXQUISITE MINIATURES Tour Director
In the summer of 2008, we were asked by Dr. David J. Wagner
to consider allowing him to exhibit our miniature paintings in museums. Knowing Dave’s reputation and success with
other artists we enthusiastically said yes!
We knew from the start, that it would likely be years before something
was scheduled, if at all, so we set ourselves in for the long haul. We were
surprised when Dave called mere weeks later.
One of the nation’s top museums with collections of historic miniature
paintings had requested our show! We
were scheduled to premiere at the R. W. Norton Art Gallery in Shreveport, LA in
July of 2010. It had been 25 years since
the Norton staged their last exhibition pertaining to miniature painting, Portrait Miniatures in Early American
History, 1750-1840, and they felt it was time to do another one
featuring modern American miniaturists who had been featured in a variety of
group exhibitions at the Norton over the years . . . the Siegrists!
While we were still floating on cloud nine, Dave called with
more news. The West Baton Rouge Museum
was also interested in our work. Would
we be able to stage a second concurrent exhibition of 50 more paintings? Borrowing back nearly 50 paintings from
collectors to augment our available work to comprise the varied content of the
exhibitions was a herculean task. It paled
only slightly in comparison to the mountain of logistics associated with 100
paintings on exhibit! Floating in the
stratosphere now with two solo museum exhibitions on the horizon, Dave pushed
us into space with the news that the works in Baton Rouge, LA would be going on
tour!
Staging a museum exhibition
involves a lot of paperwork!
Presentations, lectures and
workshops at venues on the tour
To date, EXQUISITE MINIATURES BY WES & RACHELLE SIEGRIST
includes over 200 paintings, will be displayed 5,588 days in 21 exhibitions at
19 venues and has traveled thousands of miles across the country and back to 15
States! And more venues are pending!
Click here to view the EXQUISITE MINIATURES
Exhibition overview
(Links to more
photos, installation images and paintings are at the bottom of the page)
PREMIERE
May 4 - July 25, 2010
R.W. Norton Art
Gallery
Shreveport, LA
CONCURRENT EXHIBITION
May 16 - July 31,
2010
West Baton Rouge
Museum
Port Allen, LA
TOUR
September 4 -
November 28, 2010
Rolling Hills
Wildlife Adventure
Salina, KS
December 11, 2010 -
March 13, 2011
Arizona-Sonora Desert
Museum
Tucson, AZ
April 16 - May 15,
2011
Dunnegan Gallery of
Art
Bolivar, MO
June 10 - August 28,
2011
Museum of the
Southwest
Midland, TX
September 17 -
October 16, 2011
Yadkin Cultural Arts
Center
Yadkinville, NC
November 5 - December
31, 2011
Dennos Museum Center
Northwestern Michigan
College, Traverse City, MI
January 21 - March
21, 2012
San Diego Natural
History Museum
Balboa Park, San
Diego, CA
May 15 - October 13,
2012
Nevada State Museum
Carson City, NV
November 15 - December
21, 2012
Yadkin Cultural Arts
Center
Yadkinville, NC
January 10 - March
10, 2013
The ArtCenter Manatee
Bradenton, FL
April 7 - June 2,
2013
Museum of the Gulf
Coast
Port Arthur, TX
August 10, 2013 -
January 5, 2014
Kenosha Public Museum
Kenosha, WI
February 1, 2014 -
April 6, 2014
The Wildlife
Experience
Parker, CO
July 12, 2014 -
November 7, 2014
Roger Tory Peterson
Institute of Natural History
Jamestown, NY
December 1, 2014 -
April 15, 2015
Steamboat Art Museum
Steamboat Springs, CO
September 4 - October
30, 2015
Yadkin Cultural Arts
Center
Yadkinville, NC
November 4 – December
4, 2016
Dane G. Hansen
Memorial Museum
Logan, KS
June 4 - September 3,
2017
Stauth Memorial
Museum
Montezuma, KS
September 21 -
December 21, 2017
Mari Sandoz High Plains
Heritage Center
Chadron, NE
EXQUISITE MINIATURES
is available for display at art, cultural, and scientific institutions. For tour and scheduling information, contact:
David J. Wagner,
Ph.D.
Curator/Tour Director
EXQUISITE MINIATURES
Tour Office
David J. Wagner,
L.L.C.
Phone: (414) 221-6878
davidjwagnerllc@yahoo.com
www.davidjwagnerllc.com
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