Drawings From Wright Archives on View

Frank Lloyd Wright fans will want to make a trip to Arizona to see more than 300 of his original drawings, dating from 1887-1959, which have just gone on view at the Phoenix Art Museum. “Frank Lloyd Wright Drawings: Masterworks from the Frank Lloyd Wright Archives” is drawn from an unprecedented loan of rarely exhibited original drawings and sketches from the architect’s archives at Taliesin West, a National Historic Landmark in Scottsdale, Ariz.

Divided into nine sections, the show focuses on Wright’s residential buildings, religious structures, high-rise buildings, civic and cultural buildings, commercial and educational buildings, architecture and engineering, graphic and decorative designs, the Imperial Hotel in Tokyo, and other hotels, inns and resorts.

Original drawings and conceptual sketches for many of Wright’s most famous buildings, such as Fallingwater in Pennsylvania and the Guggenheim Museum in New York, are included.

The show is the first major installment of “Arizona Celebrates Frank Lloyd Wright,” a yearlong statewide program aimed at focusing attention on the principles of the man known as one of the 20th Century’s greatest architects.

The exhibition, which is not scheduled to travel elsewhere, is considered one of the most important retrospective exhibitions of Wright’s work. It runs through April 8.

SEARCH: California State Summer School for the Arts has begun its 1990 Arts Search to identify the most talented high school artists in California. Artists selected for the program will attend a special art institute to be held at Mills College in Oakland, from July 14 through Aug. 11. The school has programs in the visual arts as well as in theater, music, dance and creative writing and film/video. Scholarships will be available for many of the 400 students selected. The application deadline is Feb. 2. For more information, contact the CSSA office at (916) 323-9614.

OPEN HOUSE: Otis/Parsons Art Institute will introduce its evening and weekend spring semester courses with a free open house today from 1-3 p.m. The open house will provide a chance to obtain information about the institute’s courses (which begin Saturday) and to meet the instructors. Students registering at the open house will receive a $25 registration discount. In addition, Academy-Award nominee Edmund Penney, instructor for the new course “Uses of Art in Media: As Art, As Biography, As Art Direction,” will preview and discuss his most recent documentary works, including “Shin’enkan”, a film about the design and construction of the Los Angeles County Museum of Art’s Pavilion for Japanese Art. Penney’s talk will begin in room 210 at 2:30 p.m. The Institute is at 2401 Wilshire Blvd. For more information, call (213) 251-0501.

NOTES: A collection of 153 rare Chinese Ming through Qing Dynasty textiles have been donated to the Santa Barbara Museum of Art. The collection, worth an estimated $250,000, was the gift of internationally known textile collectors and scholars Mary V. and Ralph B. Hays. Museum director Richard V. West said the collection includes costumes, accessories, furnishings and fragments. . . . The J. Paul Getty Museum on Saturday is holding “Looking at Portraits,” a program for children 8-12 and their parents to explore portraits in the Getty’s collection. The two one-hour programs, which will be held at 10 a.m. and 2 p.m., will address the functions of portraits, including what they reveal about the sitter and the period and culture in which he or she lived. Reservations are required. For information, call the Getty at (213) 459-7611, Ext. 300. . . . The Long Beach Museum of Art has announced the recipients of its 1989 Video Access Program awards. The winners are: Victoria Bearden and Sam Mithani in the Video Art category; Zahra Dowlatabadi and Gina Lamb in the Short Documentary category, and Rachel Rosenthal and the team of Erik Saks and Pat Tierney in the 30/60 Second Spot category.