Future Exhibitions

The Homestead Series celebrates the150th anniversary of the Homestead Act, which was signed into law by President Abraham Lincoln on May 20, 1862. All twelve images in the series, illustrate part of the epic story of this revolutionary time in history.  Devastation of the native prairie, recreating the western frontier, isolation and displacement are a few of the themes explored.  Each watercolor painting was created independently from the others using different art techniques, styles and approaches to portray the variety of people and experiences which comprised the Homestead Movement.  Viewed as a whole, The Homestead Series connects our present experience with the lives of those who changed our land forever.

Capturing America’s Heartland

This collection of paintings depicts the fabric of the Midwest—both the land and the people.  By creating a “sense of place,” the viewer is invited to respond to the moods, colors and textures integrated throughout each composition.  The images in Capturing America’s Heartland speak to the human experience and connect the viewer to the greater landscape of the world around them. 

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The PLAC Education Department offers art education to over 2000 students, ages pre-school through ninth grade, each year. Please stop into the art center to enjoy the freshness of the works created by these budding artists, displayed professionally in a true gallery setting. The artwork of these little hands of Dickinson County may outweigh any art you might have seen before.

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4 Schools. 320 Works of Art. One fabulous show!
Always our most attended exhibition - artworks by kindergarten through high school students, from all schools located in Dickinson County will be exhibited at this annual show, including Lake Park, Okoboji, Spirit Lake & Terril/Graettinger. The show is judged by a team of professional artists and placement ribbons are awarded.

Sponsored by The Dickinson County Endowment Fund and Liberty Bank

Supported by these local insurance agencies:

Farm Bureau Financial Services, Mike Thoreson, Agent

Bank Midwest Insurance Services

MHR Insurance, Milford

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Minnesota artist David Strom will feature his colorful paintings and pen & ink drawings. Compositions grow and flourish in a rectangular border around a central image, much like a series of film stills, comic book frames, or windows on a computer screen in Strom's body of work. Paintings reveal colors of mark making over time; pen and ink drawings are direct and final. Recognizable subject matter, such as steel grain bins, become sources of groupings and arrangments.

Strom is the Best of Show winner of 2010 Wanda J. Skogerboe Juried Exhibition.

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The Pearson Art Foundation Collection holds numerous works by artists recognizable to many art enthusiasts. Works by Norman Rockwell, Grandma Moses, Picasso, Larry Rivers, Willem de Kooning, Robert Rauschenberg, Jasper Johns, and the Wyeth family will be on display, along with many others.

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Macafee paints landscapes and still lifes emphasizing lights and shapes in contemporary realism style. Hamilton's work is individualized by the development of his own blend of stoneware clay and glazes; bowls and platters reflecting images of clouds, wind and water. Together, Macafee's spatially emphatic subjects (so direct, detailed, and eye-catching) and color palette complement Hamilton's direct, yet pronounced ceramics.

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Four Friends of the Pearson Lakes Art Center have graciously allowed selected works from their personal collections to be on loan for the public to view. It will be a glimpse of the favorites of an individual or family that has chosen to make art a part of their everyday life. Some collect a particular vein or media; others acquire a piece as a reminder of favorite moment, pastime, or trip; maybe the piece has evoked such a strong response that it has encouraged ownership. After all, why do we like a piece of artwork? Especially so much that we make it our own?

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The PLAC is proud to have the opportunity to exhibit works by nationally known artist, Austin Deuel, from Scottsdale, AZ. Deuel is a member of the American Indian and Cowboy Artists Association, and as a Marine Combat Artist, is also known for his large-scale public sculptures located throughout the United States, including San Antonio's Vietnam Veterans Memorial dedicated in 1986.

Sponsored by John & Karen Goodenow

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Travis Rice explores the unseen formations of the microscopic world and translates it into his own fictional webbing of systems and structures. Such natural physical phenomena as a cough or sneeze has moved beyond the tradtional surface of canvas and paper and into an environment meant to walk through, on, and touch - resulting in a transformation of the Gallery into an art experience specific to the space. Artist Represented by the Moberg Gallery, Des Moines, IA.

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Sioux City painter Mark Kochen likes to paint the cute/whimsical/adorable/goofy.
Kochen's play on multiples and his colorful palette will make this a show you won't want to miss. Crabs and Cupcakes, anyone? Maybe Ghosts and Toasts?

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Noah crafts elaborate narrative scenes and frames them with the use of historic photographic processes and antique equipment. The historic processes lend the image not only a historical aesthetic but also create serendipitous haunting textures. Together the photographic processes' aesthetic and the narrative create his own photographic "evidence" of stories, discoveries, and inventions lost in the shuffle of time. Artist Represented by the Moberg Gallery, Des Moines, IA.

Sponsored by Anne Thorne Weaver

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National Parks West includes large-scale color and black & white images of a dozen of America's most beautiful national parks and monuments including: Glacier, Yellowstone, The Grand Tetons, Theodore Roosevelt, Badlands, Devil's Tower, Rocky Mountain, Great Sand Dunes, Monument Valley, Arches, and Big Bend. The two dozen images were photographed in HighDynamic Range color. They are printed two feet in height and are from three feet to six feet in length.

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Working in oil and a homemade wax medium, Iowa artist, Mary Ortner's large-scale work transforms a variety of landscapes, including cornfields and desert skies, with her carefully chosen brush strokes. Ortner is a self-taught artist who took up painting while living in Washington, D.C., at the time the Washington Color School was at its height - later showing in many D.C. and New York galleries.

"What moves my hand across the canvas is that behind the face of nature - not the face itself." - Mary Ortner

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This is a biannual, juried exhibition designed to further the art center's mission by supporting and exhibiting contemporary art from the greater Midwest. Open to all artists 18 years of age and older, this exhibition traditionally brings together a diverse group of artists working in a variety of media. Wanda Skogerboe was a special person with an appreciation for the arts. She enjoyed being a volunteer at the Pearson Lakes Art Center as well as telling people about the wonderful Lakes Area.

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The PLAC's Permanent Collection has many examples of work by prominent midwestern artists as well as examples of national and international artists. Midwestern artists include painters Gary Kelley, Ann McTaggart, and printmaker Mauricio Lasansky. International artists include painter Larry Rivers & pop artist Andy Warhol. Take advantage of this chance to experience excellence in artwork right here in your own backyard!

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