New Museum Los Gatos is charting new museum territory. The current show, “Community Ignition Partnership and Artmaking in the Disability Arts Community,” is up and will run to March 21, 2027. It is an exciting show with a different slant on art and the artists who create it. This tactile multimedia exhibition in the main gallery is extraordinary.
In other display areas, “Reawakening” is up through Jan. 3, and History Hall displays “Los Gatos History Project: Uncovering Untold Stories.”
An endowment
This is all possible, in part due to the very generous creation of the “Michael & Alyce Parsons Art Endowment Fund” established a few years back. Kimberly Snyder, executive director at NUMU, stated, “This endowment helps NUMU with continuing operational expenses over the years, and because of their generosity, it really just helps us. It helps to keep NUMU running. It was that bleak prior to this record breaking gift. The Parsons started the endowment with a million-dollar contribution. It just really helps us operationally. Mike is a past president of our board of directors and remains active—you just missed him. He was here this morning.” Snyder added, “Mike was part of the group that advocated for the museum to come to this location.” This space previously housed the Town library.
ArtNow
Snyder continues, “The Mike and Alyce Parson’s art endowment really helps with our annual high school juried exhibition. The Parsons also contribute to the scholarships that have been awarded to the high schoolers who enter and place in this annual Santa Clara County-wide event. Promoting young people in the arts and on the board at NUMU helps to keep art alive in Los Gatos and the surrounding area. The Parsons’ generous endowment also helps in the creation of shows like this.”
Communities need museums
“What they did was plant some seeds, and it really helped us start gaining momentum; and the museum really just had kind of continued to grow since that point,” Snyder went on. “That gift really made the museum more sustainable over the years.” Note, the Parsons’ gift is structured so that it will continue on in perpetuity. Snyder concluded, “Their gift has just laid a solid foundation for the museum to continue and display shows like this.”
The Parsons’ generous endowment helped in the creation of “Community Ignition; Partnership and Artmaking in the Disability Arts Community.” This show reveals how art can be created in any community. The idea is that, through conversation and support with interdependence, art can reach everyone.
This is not a typical exhibition. In this show there is art to watch (videos), there are “Resting Rocks.” In a corner there is an interactive loom where you can sit and add rows of weaving, creating a community-made woven hanging. Fabric on the wall invites attendees to add a charm to the “in process” work of art. One might consider that this self-stimulation action helps to soothe sensory overload.
At the “Resting Rocks,” by Jullian Crochet, many velvet pouches—pillows of different shapes and sizes containing sand—were displayed. Attendees are invited to gently approach, pick up and arrange the “rocks” with mindfulness. It is an amazing feeling to be able to pick up a display, in a museum and to be part of the art work. Why not? Isn’t Los Gatos where the “Pet Rock” was created?
Might as well take everyone to see the current engaging and memorable exhibit that includes art that can be touched and enjoyed. You can contribute to the museum’s art while you’re here.
The Los Gatos History Project
NUMU also has a downstairs gallery displaying local and relevant historical objects, helping to keep the past alive. If you are local, you may discover a long lost relative. It’s an effort to catalog and dive deeper into the permanent collection. The current exhibition, the first to come out of the project, presents a selection of objects that have given the museum more questions than answers. By taking a critical look at these objects and the stories they tell, the exhibition will prompt visitors to ask: Who made these objects? Why did the museum collect them? What can we learn from them? And whose stories are missing? Through this exhibition, visitors will gain a greater understanding of museum collecting practices, and a greater appreciation for the hidden complexities of Los Gatos history.
Open Thursday-Sunday, 10am-4pm. Take the kids and grandpa and/or grandma, or maybe the next door neighbor? Expose children to museum attendance. In the lower level area, where the “Los Gatos History Hall” is located, there are “Maker Space” tables. On the upper floor in the “Spotlight Gallery” and in the lobby area, the “Reawaking” exhibition displays the revitalization of the Muwekma Ohlone culture, depicting the Indigenous group’s close ties to nature.
There are also monthly lectures in the History Hall. Next month, on Thursday, Nov. 19, at 11am, our executive editor and publisher, Dan Pulcrano, will be speaking.
Did you know that the museum is available to rent? Info: numulosgatos.org/rent
