Lotus World Music Festival, nylon & silk festival decorations; Brandon Gunn & Ellie Honl, printmaking; Robert Price, photography. Browse multiple galleries in a beautiful, historic setting. M-F 9-7; Sat 9-5.

The Mathers Museum exhibition hall and Museum Store are open Tuesdays through Fridays, from 9 a.m. to 4:30 p.m.; and Saturdays and Sundays, from 1 p.m. to 4:30 p.m.; and closed all major holidays.

Free visitor parking is available by the Indiana Avenue lobby entrance. Metered parking is available at the McCalla School parking lot on the corner of Ninth Street and Indiana Avenue. The parking lot also has spaces designated for Indiana University C and E permits. During the weekends free parking is available on the surrounding streets.

“Açaí From Local to Global”
“Açaí From Local to Global” examines the transition of the açaí berry from a local Brazilian commodity to a global superfood. The exhibition is curated by Eduardo Brondizio and Andrea Siqueria, and sponsored by Themester 2014’s “Eat, Drink, Think: Food from Art to Science,” an initiative of the IU College of Arts and Sciences.
This exhibit runs until December 21.

“Food is Work: Tools and Traditions”
“Food is Work: Tools and Traditions” explores the tools and traditions used in the production of food. The exhibition is also sponsored by Themester 2014’s “Eat, Drink, Think: Food from Art to Science,” an initiative of the IU College of Arts and Sciences.
This exhibit runs until December 21.

“Instruments of Culture”
“Instruments of Culture” provides an overview of how musical instruments around the globe are classified and studied, and why.
This exhibit runs until December 21.

“In Their Own Words: Native Americans in World War I”
“In Their Own Words: Native Americans in World War I” illustrates WWI experiences using photographs and veterans’ stories.
This exhibit runs until December 21.

“The People of the Coffee Highlands of Nicaragua”
“The People of the Coffee Highlands of Nicaragua” traces coffee’s journey from the fields to our cups in a photo essay by Claudia Gordillo, funded by IU’s Center for Latin American and Caribbean Studies, the Office of Global Educational Programs, and the US Department of State.
This exhibit runs until December 21.

“Thoughts, Things, and Theories…What Is Culture?”
“Thoughts, Things, and Theories…What Is Culture?” explores the nature of culture.
This exhibit runs until December 21.

“State of an Art: Women’s Wall Painting in Ghana”
“State of an Art: Women’s Wall Painting in Ghana” will show tradition and innovation in wall paintings by women in Ghana’s Upper East Region, as documented by photographer and curator Brittany Sheldon.
This exhibit runs until December 21.

“Auto Indiana”
From Elwood Haynes’s early machine to today’s numerous parts manufacturers, this exhibition examines the role of the automobile in the Hoosier State. Indiana was one of the leaders in automobile production until the 1930’s when Detroit emerged as the nation’s technological and industrial giant. Come see the Howe car, Monroe County’s first automobile, graciously on loan from the Mathers Museum of World Cultures. Runs through December 31.

The History Center is open Tuesday-Saturday from 10am-4pm.

”The content of color paints our days and nights. We prefer certain colors and color combinations, Colors have dispositions indicative of regions, origins, harmonics.” The 32 pieces of fine contemporary art, created by Martha Kaplan, are from three different series. The ‘New Kachinas’ are graphite and colored pencils and are a leap of faith from the side of the mind that is new territory. ‘Large Lace Paperworks’ are mixed media drawings setting out to restructure the disparities of the burdens of the world and ‘Pastels’ are the bridge where conscious and unconscious space can meet.

Exhibit will run August 1 through September 27
Closed Sundays

Hours: Tuesday – Saturday: 10:00 – 5:00 p.m. Sunday: Noon – 5:00 p.m.

New in the Galleries:

Eat, Drink, and Be Merry: Partying in Ancient Greece and Rome
Continuing through December 28, 2014
Gallery of the Arts of Asia and the Ancient Western World, second floor

Pop Food
Continuing through December 28, 2014
Gallery of the Art of the Western World, Doris Steinmetz Kellett Endowed Gallery of Twentieth-Century Art, first floor
Food provided a perfect subject for Pop artists. This installation includes a sweet treat by Wayne Thiebaud, an out-of-this-world still-life by Andy Warhol, and an artwork created with food as its medium by Edward Ruscha.

The Politics of Food
Continuing through December 28, 2014
Gallery of the Art of the Western World, first floor
This installation focuses on several contemporary artists who use food as a reflection on consumerism and cultural identity (Chuck Ramirez), a social commentary on excess and gluttony (Tom Huck), and a platform for political activism on animal rights (Sue Coe).

Celebrating 35 years of creativity from By Hand members and their friends. Arts and crafts by members and friends of By Hand will be displayed with refreshments and music will be provided by the younger generation of By Hand members.

“Boxes” a special exhibit by Steve Rapp will also be on display. He describes his boxes as a museum of Earth’s wonders, each with a unique fingerprint. Wood is the main medium with emphasis on minerals, fossils, artifacts, and sea life. He goes on to explain that most significant is this ability to manipulate these natural wonders of our Earth into a visual metaphor, expressing his vision of nature’s beauty.

“Celebrating Lotus Exhibit”
From his quaint hometown in Orange County, Indiana to cities all over America, Southern Indiana musician Lotus Dickey made his mark on the musical world. A prolific singer-songwriter who played guitar and fiddle, Dickey had a love for music unmatched by any other. In honor of the legend, the Lotus World Music and Arts Festival was established in Bloomington in 1994 as a celebration of music, song, dance, and art. As the 21st Lotus Festival approaches, the Monroe County History Center Community Voices Gallery presents: Celebrating Lotus.
This exhibit runs until November 29.

A self-portrait need not encompass traditional ideas- one can even break away from depicting one’s face, the element typically associated with self-portraits; in my photography the tree has become symbolic of myself which has led me to realize I am creating “self-portrayals” that allow me to create pieces that are as diverse as I am.

Exhibit runs until October 2.

Blending guitar and bass, Lick Creek affectionately renders rock, pop, jazz, and original music into their back porch tuneful stylings. The band folds into the lyrical mix tightly woven harmonies reflecting years of close-knit musical association. Regardless of the genre, you”ll still hear the sweetness of informal back porch jam sessions combined with tight vocal harmony & the musical connection shared by good friends.

In the fifth of his Meditations on First Philosophy, Descartes asserts that “Certainty, and the truth of all science, depend solely upon knowledge of the true God.” And indeed, Descartes prides himself on having proved God’s existence not through revelation, but through reason. In my talk, I argue that Descartes’s effort to establish a link between the existence of God and the ability of the human mind to think without using images needs to be understood in the context of the endless polemics swirling around the concept of idolatry in seventeenth-century France. Descartes saw himself as solving, once and for all, a question that had reached a particularly nasty impasse—what is the proper role of images, and even the created world, in attaining knowledge of God? Yet by releasing the mind from the imagination and by defining the will through its godlike independence, Descartes raises the possibility, paradoxically often identified as idolatrous, that humans are capable of creation. The philosopher’s repeated, and often derisive, rejection of this possibility, both in the Meditations and in his responses to his contemporaries’ objections, demonstrates that the specter of idolatry, broadly defined as a reversal of the relationship between Creator and creation, is not so easily dismissed in a century still transitioning to what we now call modernity.

Ellen McClure is Associate Professor of History and French and Francophone Studies at the University of Illinois at Chicago.

This lecture is made possible through the support of the College Arts and Humanities Institute, the College of Arts and Sciences, the Office of the Provost, the Mary-Margaret Barr Koon Fund of the Department of French and Italian, and the Department of Religious Studies. There will be coffee, tea and light refreshments.