TULSA, OKLA.- Philbrook Downtown will open to the public on Friday, June 14, 2013 following ten preview days for Philbrook Members (June 2 – 13, 2013). This satellite space, an expansion from the original 23-acre main campus in Midtown Tulsa, enables Philbrook to allocate significant additional gallery space to their expansive Native American art and growing modern and contemporary art collections.

Philbrook Downtown is located within Mathews Warehouse, a renovation project initiated by the George Kaiser Family Foundation, which brings 80,000 square feet of arts programming into the “Brady Arts District.” Philbrook worked with Gluckman Mayner Architects, New York, to renovate its 30,000 square feet into two floors of elegant gallery space with expansive ceilings and open floor plans. Other Gluckman Mayner projects have included the Museo Picasso (Malaga, Spain) and the Andy Warhol Museum (Pittsburgh, U.S.A.) to name a few.

Philbrook will dedicate the main gallery space on the ground floor to modern and contemporary art. The opening exhibition, Opening Abstraction, will present an arrangement of artwork focusing on one of the most revolutionary approaches taken in twentieth- and twenty-first century art: abstraction. This gathering of works, drawn mostly from Philbrook’s permanent collection, will touch on some of the many manifestations that abstraction has taken, from stylized approaches of recognizable subjects to completely non-representational work.

The main gallery on the second level allows Philbrook to present the recently acquired Eugene B. Adkins Collection alongside the Museum’s own collection of Native American work. Combined, these collections present one of the finest surveys of twentieth-century Native American art. The opening exhibition, Identity & Inspiration in 20th Century Native American Art, will present selections from the Museum’s extensive and diverse Native American collections to investigate the themes of preservation, adaptation, innovation, and integration. Throughout the show, the focus remains on the artists themselves as agents of creativity and influence.

The second floor will also include the much anticipated Adkins Collection & Study Center. Using the Eugene B. Adkins Collection and Philbrook’s own Native American art collection as organizational cornerstones, the Center’s primary focus will be the exhibition and study of Native American art.

Two smaller galleries on the first floor allow Philbrook Downtown to feature more frequently changing exhibitions. The June 14th opening will feature the exhibition Adolph Gottlieb: Sculpture on loan from the Adolph & Esther Gottlieb Foundation, as well as a second show on female artists of the Southwest, titled Sirens of the Southwest, which focuses on a distinctive combination of female artists of the Southwest.