Kansas City’s Must-Visit Contemporary Art Galleries

Benefitting from its location in and relation to the Kansas City Art Institute, the H&R Block Artspace began operations in 1999, and has since motivated to develop a high-quality exhibition space in the city. Showing the work of graduating students, alumni, and staff in addition to established artists, the space has hosted over 100 shows since its inception, and is home to an annual BFA exhibit. The building’s west wall is a canvas for the Artspace Project Wall – a public ‘gallery’ that allows various artists from the region and further afield to display their projects.

Displaying works by local and international artists, Haw Contemporary attempts to bring a wide perspective on art to its Stockyard district location and does it with flair and panache despite its young age (it was founded in September 2013). Bill Haw, the owner, assures that in picking out the gallery’s artists and works, ‘it’s all about finding what’s great, and what fits’ – he does not limit the art space to one given genre or style. Indeed, the gallery’s comprehensive outlook on culture and art is attested by its diverse activities; Laura Berman’s recent exhibit, for example, featured the local artist’s intensely colored prints and was complemented by a fashion show by Finefolk, a KC-based clothing shop. Haw Contemporary is only two blocks away from PLUG Projects: the two are best visited during the same culture-filled afternoon in Kansas City.

The Kansas City Artists Coalition, or KCAC for short, is run by and for artists. Their mission is to promote the visual arts in Missouri and beyond while nurturing the professional opportunities available to local creatives. Since 1976, the coalition has been organizing events, residencies, and exhibitions of a creatively free, experimental nature, spanning university undergrad shows, Lebanese artist Helen Zughaib and Kansas-based printmaker and sculptor Shawn Bitters. The sheer openness of the organization makes it an invaluable presence in KC and Missouri, and the definitive art space in the city to get to grips with the local culture climate.