For 50 summers, the most promising emerging artists in our state have descended on Quartz Mountain State Park & Lodge in remote southwestern Oklahoma. There they spend part of their summer studying with outstanding professional artist-mentors active in their respective fields, exploring new creative skills, bonding with peers and enjoying a well-earned camp at Oklahoma’s official School of the Arts: Oklahoma Arts Institute.
Fresh off a recent commendation from the Governor acknowledging its enduring impact on generations of Oklahoma artists, educators and communities, Oklahoma Arts Institute has big plans to celebrate its success story and amazing alumni through a yearlong “50 Summers of the Oklahoma Summer Arts Institute at Quartz Mountain” series of community events.
The 50th anniversary celebration kicked off in mid-June when 233 high school students from 40 different Oklahoma communities opened the highly competitive Oklahoma Summer Arts Institute, led by a faculty of 35 guest artists from across the United States. For two intensive weeks, young participants are saturated in one of eight artistic disciplines: acting, chorus, creative writing, dance, drawing and painting, film and video, orchestra or photography. The program very much remains a summer edition of the classic 1980 movie musical Fame with equal parts fun, drama and intensity.
This year’s participants will channel their creativity to help commemorate the 50th celebration with several free public performances at the Robert M. Kerr Performing Arts Center at Quartz Mountain. Over the last two weekends in June, the chorus and orchestra students perform multiple concerts, and acting and dance students each have performances, as well as a visual art gallery opening, poetry reading and film screening where talent and hard work are readily on display.
You know they’re ready to party when returning OAI guest artist Pamela Ross brought an exciting kick-off concert performance of the Motown-inspired HITCity: Temptations Edition, featuring the golden pipes of five current Broadway leading men. Another evening highlights the artistic collaborations that naturally grow out of the Arts Institute when the 145th Army Band, “The Governor’s Own,” will perform alongside a “Mosaic” of student performances that demonstrate how the artistic disciplines fit together as part of the nationwide “America250” celebration. More free “OnStage” events are in the works over the coming anniversary year.
While the Oklahoma Summer Arts Institute has served over 5,500 aspiring high school art students over its lifespan, its programs have expanded year-round with a thriving Fall Institute catering to adults and educators interested in literary, visual and performing arts. That could mean learning hands-on printmaking from accomplished Norman-based artist and OU professor Marwin Begaye. Or it could be exploring place and landscape through photography among the granite boulders piled up around Quartz Mountain with Idaho-based instructor Laura McPhee. There are no fewer than a dozen workshop options for adults to experiment with.
The summer, however, is when the Quartz Mountain lodge is humming with activity. Equipped with five dedicated pavilions along Lake Altus-Lugert, students can enjoy lake views from their dance, writing and visual art studios. A rare photography darkroom, a library and an outdoor amphitheater also support the artistic smorgasbord. As a residential camp, everyone is flung together in a mostly well-oiled machine at Quartz Mountain State Park & Lodge. where Oklahoma Arts Institute has been an anchor tenant since 1978.
If we turn back the clock to that very first summer, the Oklahoma Summer Arts Institute began as a three-day pilot program near Tahlequah with Oklahoma luminaries like ballerina Maria Tallchief on the faculty. Would you believe a teenaged Megan Mullally participated in the first Institute as a mime artist?! Funny to imagine, but it shows how there are any number of paths to develop as an artist. Fun fact: The first year also produced today’s most recorded classical harpist, Yolanda Kondonassis. That’s just scratching the surface of the impressive alumni list.
While a career in the arts isn’t necessarily the final destination
for emerging student artists, the experiences of OAI programs help participants develop valuable AI-proof skills. Leadership, collaboration, communication and problem-solving are central to any serious arts practice.
Shannon Gilbert, President and CEO of the Oklahoma Arts Institute, sees these benefits blossom annually. “Oklahoma Arts Institute represents the best of what arts education can accomplish,” Gilbert observed. “The arts help students grow not only as artists, but as people.
They teach resilience, empathy, discipline and creativity. Those skills matter everywhere.”
Programs like Oklahoma Arts Institute not only showcase our state’s talent; they strengthen our communities with citizens enriched by their participation in the arts. That is something to celebrate now and fund for 50 more summers.
This article appears in America At 250.