Dorri Partain
Managing Editor

From the tiniest final piece from a set of Russian nesting dolls to a six-foot hand-carved wooden crocodile, the latest exhibit at the Museum of Kansas City (3218 Gladstone Blvd.) brings a world of culture to Historic Northeast in time for the World Cup soccer event.

Opened to the public on Friday, June 12,  Connecting Cultures Across Kansas City: The Hand-in-Hand Folk Art Collection is presented through a collaboration with the Mattie Rhodes Center and on display at the museum’s second floor gallery through January 10. 2027. This exhibit showcases a small portion of a collection donated by Alice Ann Biggerstaff (1924- 2007), an artist with an interest in hand-crafted, unique art pieces created with simple materials and cultural references.

Following her retirement from Hallmark Cards as a greeting card artist, Biggerstaff moved to Santa Fe, New Mexico and filled her home— a two-bedroom condo— with a vast array of objects including ceramics, carvings, paintings, toys and dolls, textiles and clothing. In 1995, Biggerstaff donated a portion of her collection to the Greater Kansas City Community Foundation, which in turn partnered with the Mattie Rhodes Center in 1999 to exhibit featured objects.  The completion of a $5 million Cultural Art Center (1701 Jarboe Ave.) three years ago provided a permanent home for 50 curated items from the original collection of 800 pieces.

Christina Loya, Mattie Rhodes Center’s curator, selected 200 objects for this special exhibition, drawing on the collection’s strongest representations of specific regions and cultures.

“The strongest areas of the collection are from Latin America — specifically Mexico— and the American Southwest,” said Loya. “So for this one (exhibit), we wanted it to coincide with World Cup; we don’t necessarily have pieces from all the places that are visiting for World Cup but we did have some from Argentina, some from Mexico.”

Loya chose pieces that helped tell a story about the art that Biggerstaff was drawn to as she connected with artists, supporting the creativity and cultural stories each piece represents, as well as her personal favorites.

“I like the big, bright colorful animals, we have a giant six-foot crocodile- I love to show him. The bigger, brighter, the bolder, the better.”

During a preview of the exhibit on Thursday, June 11, friends of Biggerstaff reminisced about seeing familiar pieces that once graced the artist’s Santa Fe home and their personal favorites.

John Fierro, CEO and Director for the Mattie Rhodes Center, stated that he felt lucky to have seen the collection in Biggerstaff’s home and through her donation of the collection that “she wanted to make sure the history of all these communities, that the folk art represented were preserved and the stories would continue.”

Fierro also stated that “our partnership with the Museum (of Kansas City) has additional venue opportunities for Kansas City, to not only get to know the folk art but also get to know Alice Ann.”

Loya said that preparing for this exhibit took nearly two years of planning, to ensure each piece could be attributed to its region, culture and artist, if known. Through donations from other collections and artists from Hallmark Cards, the current collection now contains 1500 pieces that have been documented and cataloged by Loya and her staff.

The six-foot crocodile (cipactli- thorny being) carving can be traced to pre-Columbian cosmology while the Calavera Alibrije is a fantastical creature tied to Mexican folklore. From functional pottery to whimsical pieces created just to display, each selection tells a story about the cultural artist that created the item.

Earlier this year, an additional gallery exhibit titled Homeland:The Osage in Missouri, opened to offer visitors a chance to understand the contributions and cultural continuity through displays of textiles, regalia and art associated with the Osage people. Curated by Jimmy Lee Beeson II, a citizen of the Osage Nation, this exhibit will be open through February 21,2027.

Admission to the Museum of Kansas City is free; a full list of exhibits and upcoming activities can be found at www.museumofkansacity.org or call 816-702-7700.

All photos by Dorri Partain