April 11, 2025
MO Humanities Grant News
Missouri Humanities has awarded a $12,550 grant to the Missouri Folk Arts Program to support an event series that shares the meaning and matter of its Traditional Arts Apprenticeship Program (TAAP), one of the oldest and longest-running efforts of its kind in the country. “Our Missouri Humanities grant provides us the opportunity to celebrate TAAP’s four decades and, by extension, hundreds of traditional artists who have participated over the years,” says Lisa Higgins, director of Missouri Folk Arts Program. “Every TAAP team from 1985 to the present has illustrated in word and practice how folk art…
Jan. 9, 2024
2024 Apprenticeship Teams Announced
LauraLee Rose is a rug hooker apprenticing with Mary Barile. Rose submitted this rug as a work sample with their application. Columbia, Mo., June 8, 2024—Missouri Folk Arts is thrilled to announce the seven teams participating in the 39th annual Traditional Arts Apprenticeship Program (TAAP). They are engaged actively in a series of one-on-one lessons and will continue through the spring. Stay tuned to Missouri Folk Arts’ website and social media for 2024 team profiles, progress, and special events. Please help us congratulate the following artists: Mary Barile…
May 6, 2022
2022 Apprenticeship Team, Tappel & Kirby
2022 Traditional Arts Apprenticeship Program: Gigmakers Bernard Tappel & John Kirby Missouri Folk Arts staff is happy to sustain the Traditional Arts Apprenticeship Program, especially through the last two years! In the current year of the project, the 37th annual, six teams have worked over the last several months to teach and learn their traditions. Staff has been happy to support the artists with master artist honoraria, travel, and supplies with funds provided by the National Endowment for the Arts, Missouri Arts Council, Mizzou’s…
March 22, 2021
Exhibit: MO Blacksmiths Sampler
In 2019, Mid-America Arts Alliance and Missouri Folk Arts partnered to create a blacksmithing exhibition at the M-AAA offices at the Crossroads in Kansas City, Mo. Bernard Tappel of Osage Bluff Blacksmith Shop provided expert input and loaned objects. That exhibition and accompanying “hammer in” with Tappel and Mike McLaughlin were very well-received, but the event was short-lived. Fast forward to 2020, Missouri Folk Arts hoped to install a smaller version as the newest Focus Exhibit in March at the Museum of…
Jan. 14, 2021
State of Stories: Missouri Quilting
On January 14, 2021, Missouri Folk Arts director Lisa Higgins joined Missouri 2021 coordinator Michael Sweeney for a State of Stories discussion of quilting in Missouri, hosted by Mark Livengood of The Story Center at the Mid-Continent Public Library. Dr. Lisa Higgins and Dr. Michael Sweeney describe quilting traditions from across the state as well as the state’s Bicentennial quilt. State of Stories is a series of free public programs commemorating the Missouri Bicentennial. Developed…
July 2, 2020
2020 Apprenticeship Team, Price & Eikerman
It is with great pleasure that we continue with the roll out profiles of the 2020 Traditional Arts Apprenticeship Program (TAAP) teams of master artists and apprentices. Stay tuned; we have a few more profiles to come. [Be sure to click on hyperlinks for more of the story.] James Price & Steve Eikerman: Ozark Woodworking James E. Price, PhD (Naylor, Mo.) is no stranger to the Missouri Folk Arts Program and its Traditional Arts Apprenticeship Program (TAAP). He taught his first apprentice Nick Heatherly in 1986, the project’s second year, followed closely by…
June 26, 2020
2020 Apprenticeship Team, Kasthuri & Kasthuri
It is with great pleasure that we continue with the roll out profiles of the 2020 Traditional Arts Apprenticeship Program (TAAP) teams of master artists and apprentices. Stay tuned for several updates in the next several days. [Be sure to click on hyperlinks for more of the story.] Prasanna Kasthuri and Samanvita Kasthuri, Bharatanatyam and Kathak Dance The Kasthuris join a special cadre of TAAP artists–teams who have dedicated time and space to intensively teach and study a tradition that is vital to their families. Guru Prasanna Kasthuri is well-known in St. Louis,…
June 22, 2020
2020 Apprenticeship Team, Williams & Mackey
It is with great pleasure that we continue with the roll out profiles of the 2020 Traditional Arts Apprenticeship Program (TAAP) teams of master artists and apprentices. Stay tuned for several updates in the next several days. [Be sure to click on hyperlinks for more of the story.] John P. Williams & Cynthia Mackey, Old-Time Fiddling John P. Williams (Madison, Mo.) is another Then & Now: Apprentice Journeys featured artist. In 2017, Missouri Folk Arts recorded his story of apprenticing with the late, great Boone County fiddler…
June 17, 2020
2020 Apprenticeship Team, Washington & Chandler
It is with great pleasure that we continue with the roll out profiles of the 2020 Traditional Arts Apprenticeship Program (TAAP) teams of master artists and apprentices. Stay tuned for several updates in the next several days. [Be sure to click on hyperlinks for more of the story.] Loretta Washington & Brianna Chandler African American Generational Storytelling Anyone who follows the Missouri Folk Arts Program and its Traditional Arts Apprenticeship Program should be familiar with master storyteller Loretta Washington (Florissant, Mo.), a 2003 apprentice to Dr.
March 29, 2020
2020 Apprenticeship Team, Alexander & Dickson
It is with great pleasure that we roll out profiles of the 2020 Traditional Arts Apprenticeship Program (TAAP) teams of master artists and apprentices. Our regular Show Me Folk blog readers should recognize both members of this team from posts in 2019. [Be sure to click on hyperlinks for more of the story.] Bob Alexander & Matt Dickson, Blacksmithing TAAP apprentice Matt Dickson (left) and master blacksmith Bob Alexander pose on a bench outside Alexander’s Scrub Oak Forge during a site visit in early March 2020. They are displaying hand-forged lamps and chandeliers. Photo credit: Deborah A. Bailey…