Erv covers the museum

The speaker for this morning’s program was Michael Monroe. He is the Executive Director of the Bellevue Art Museum. He gave a most interesting talk on the history of the Bellevue Art Museum and how he decided to come west from Washington D.C. to lead this art museum in our state.

He said that he arrived in 2004 and found that he had to struggle to get financing for the museum. Ultimately he obtained financing sufficient to operate the museum. He says now that the museum is very healthy and doing wonderful things. It has about twelve (12) exhibits each year that rotate in and out so there is always something new at the Art Museum.

Mr. Monroe said that the mission of this art museum is to display and to teach about “crafts.” These are objects that are created to use.

Michael Monroe with Prez.

He talked about how in 1974 he discovered Dale Chihuly and arranged for an exhibit of Chihuly glass at the Smithsonian. That was a big break for Dale Chihuly in his career.

After the speaker, we had some announcements. One announcement dealt with the fact that Santa Claus would be appearing on December 23, 2008. All members are asked to bring presents in the event they may want to receive a present from Santa. Spouses are welcome.

Joe Truglio, beloved creator of the controversial “large fine waiver”, spoke about several subjects. The first was “Operation Warm.” It was very successful. The next project is distribution of dictionaries. All the dictionaries are here and ready to be distributed starting in January. He mentioned that the Club has two dates set to help Food Lifeline package up their various foods.

The fine waiver controversy continues to heat up. At one point in the meeting, Bellevue Art Museum Director Michael Monroe was asked to take part in determining what was a real fine waiver and what was a fraudulent fine waiver. We have not heard the last of this controversy by any means.

Raffle. Fred Kempe went for the marble and enjoyed drawing a non-white marble.

RESPECTFULLY SUBMITTED this 16^th day of December, 2008.

Ervin A. DeSmet

Guest Fred Kempe gives a mighty try for the white sphere

Respectfully submitted

Next Reporter:
Eric Greenwood
December 23