FORT WAYNE, IN.- The Fort Wayne Museum of Art is presenting “Indiana Waterways: The Art of Conservation,” an exhibition of 100 paintings in oil, watercolor, pastel. The exhibition is traveling throughout the state and will be on view in Fort Wayne January 14 March 19, 2023.

The 100-painting collection, shown in its entirety in Fort Wayne, will feature more than 25 rivers, streams, and tributaries by five artists using three mediums. Accompanying the exhibition is a 200-page signed and numbered limited-edition book featuring all the artworks with essays on conservation of waterways by three Hoosier writers.

Using art, the exhibition evokes the fantastical beauty where the waterways wind through dramatically varied terrains—some plummeting 90 feet over shear rock, others cascading through limestone or prairie grass fields.

Just under the surface of all this water lies a complex subtext that the book and essayists explore. Together the traveling collection, book, and public discussions through December 2023 bring public awareness to the need to restore and protect the 65,000 plus miles of the state’s waterways – many of which, according to the EPA, still are not safe for human contact since monitoring began in the 20th century.

The multi-year painting project is funded by grants from the Indiana Arts Commission, Indiana Humanities, Izaak Walton League of America – Indiana Division Foundation, and contributions by more than 100 individuals through the non-profit Art Nature Consortium. After its Fall 2022 debut in Indianapolis and its next showing in Fort Wayne the exhibition will tour other venues until its close in December 2023 at the Hoosier Salon, New Harmony, Indiana.

General admission to see this exhibition at the museum is free for FWMoA members, $10 adults, $8 students and seniors 65+, and $25 for families. General admission is free for everyone on Thursdays 5-8pm. Veterans, active military personnel, and their families receive free general admission. FWMoA gallery hours are Tuesday-Saturday 10-6pm, Thursdays 10-8pm, and Sundays 12-5pm.

Beginning with art classes in 1888 given by J. Ottis Adams and later William Forsyth, the Fort Wayne Museum of Art has evolved into the primary resource for the visual arts in Northeast Indiana. Regularly exhibiting regional and nationally acclaimed artists, the FWMoA also boasts an extensive permanent collection of American Art, including the Steven Sorman Archives and more than 350 pieces of glass sculpture. The Museum is committed to the collection, preservation, presentation and interpretation of American and related art to engage broad and diverse audiences throughout the community and region and add value to their lives. The Fort Wayne Museum of Art is accredited by the American Alliance of Museums. This activity made possible, in part, with support from the Indiana Arts Commission and the National Endowment for the Arts, a federal agency.