Photo Contest at Amon Carter Museum in Fort Worth

The Amon Carter Museum of American Art houses one of the country's major collections of American photographs. Now, members of the community are invited to submit their own great American photographs of family and friends enjoying the museum; the images will be posted on the Amon Carter's Facebook page. The free contest will run for one month, from August 1-31, 2011. TCU Professor of Art Photography and Guest Judge Luther Smith will select the winning photographs, which will be used in various promotional and educational applications.

She Is Dallas Info:   The Amon Carter Museum of American Art is located at 3501 Camp Bowie Blvd. in Fort Worth. The Amon Carter is celebrating its 50th Anniversary throughout 2011 with outstanding exhibitions and public programs.   The museum is open Tuesday “Saturday from 10 a.m. “5 p.m., Thursday until 8 p.m. and Sunday from 12 “5 p.m. Admission is always free. For more information about the museum, please call them at 817-738-1933 or visit the Amon Carter Museum website.   In addition to their Facebook page mentioned above, you can also follow Amon Carter Museum on Twitter.

Being a part of Fort Worth for fifty years means that the museum has the pleasure of hearing from adults who fondly remember visiting the Amon Carter as school children and are now spending time in the galleries with their own families, says Andrew Walker, director. We hope the photo contest will encourage our visitors and members, both young and old, to share photographs of their museum experiences. My own children always have a great experience at the summer story times at the Amon Carter Museum.   We went last week and the theme was “Eggs”.   We listened to several stories about eggs and moved around the museum to look at paintings having something to do with eggs.   What a great way to get kids interested in learning more about art.   I love these story time programs! After the stories and art study, the kids got to decorate their own eggs to take home. As always, both of my kids had a lot of fun at the story time and craft.   I’m not proud to admit that my little 2 year old daughter’s favorite part of the day was after the egg craft when the museum offered all the kids a snack.   My little Picasso was so excited that she tried to shovel in as many chocolate cookies as she could before I caught her. I don’t think that picture will win any prizes in the contest! Of course, I took a lot of pictures of my kids enjoying the storytime, crafts, and the rest of the museum.   They particularly enjoyed the current special exhibit on The Allure Of Paper.   I even met a friendly staff person who ever-so-gently educated me that pictures are not allowed in certain special exhibits – even if they are only pictures of children enjoying the art.   Oopsie!   Please keep this in mind when you are taking your contest photos. The photo contest is open to everyone and offers three age categories for photograph submission: ages 12 and under, ages 13 “18, and ages 19 and over. A grand- prize winner as well as two runners-up will be selected in each age category to receive museum memberships; the first-place winners also receive $100 cash! The Amon Carter is looking for photographs that depict the visitor's museum experience. The images will be judged on creativity, photographic quality and how well the spirit of the museum is featured. Children and adults are invited to share their photographs of the museum, from inside the galleries (where permitted!) or outdoors. People, art, architecture ”whatever best represents the Amon Carter Museum of American Art to each participant ”are encouraged as photographic subjects. Those interested in participating should first read the rules at www.cartermuseum.org. Photographs should be emailed to we*******@ca**********.org with the photographer's name, age and telephone contact information before the August 31 deadline. Winners will be announced in September on the museum's website and Facebook page.

The Amon Carter will have one more storytime before wrapping them up for the summer.     It will take place on Wednesday, July 27th from 10:30 – 11:30 and the theme is called “A Little Bird Told Me” and it’s all about birds.   Fly high by discussing artworks depicting birds while listening to The Best Nest by P. D. Eastman, Noodle and Lou by Liz Garton Scanlon, and Raven: A Trickster Tale from the Pacific Northwest by Gerald McDermott. Fun activities and refreshments follow the stories. No reservations are required.     Storytime is brought to you in part by Bell Helicopter, A Textron Company.