OKCarchitecture

The Oklahoma City founda-tion for Architecture is work-ing closely with the Okla-homa City University School of Law to raise the funds necessary to conserve and protect two large Olinka Hrdy murals located in the historic Central High School building in downtown Okla-homa City. OCU purchased

the Central High building in 2012 and will begin con-struction next month to con-vert the building into the University’s new law school. Classes are schedule to be-gin in the new building in January 2015.

Hrdy is Oklahoma's first modern artist. She was born to Czechoslovakian immi-grants in a one-room sod hut in Prague, Oklahoma in

1902. After studying at the University of Oklahoma, Hrdy painted murals for Bruce Goff's Riverside Studio in Tulsa and was later in-vited by Frank Lloyd Wright to teach at Taliesin East. Hrdy’s murals are extremely rare as almost all of her other murals have been lost or destroyed. Only one other

Hrdy mural is known to ex-ist, and it is located at Will Rogers Middle School in Long Beach, California.

The murals at Central High School are in need of imme-diate appraisal, repair, and protection. The initial esti-mate for the restoration is $50,000. Following restora-tion the murals will be open for public viewing along with a rotating collection in the building's art gallery.

The Oklahoma City Founda-tion for Architecture is ac-cepting donations to aid Oklahoma City University in restoring and preserving this irreplaceable part of Okla-homa history.

All donations are tax de-ductible and can be made on the Oklahoma City Foun-dation for Architecture web site or at the Foundation office.

Olinka Hrdy Murals Project

OKCarchitecture

October 2013

Volume 1, Issue 1

Olinka Hrdy 1

Chairman’s

Message

2

Planned Giving 3

Photography

Competition

4

INSIDE THIS ISSUE:

Coming Spring

2014!

OKLAHOMAN-

MADE Photography

Competition

Annual Architecture

Poker Run

KIDesisgn

okcarchitecture.com

for more

information

OKLINKA HRDY MURAL PROJECT

To donate go to: www.okcarchitecture.com

Or mail your donation to:

Oklahoma City Foundation for Architecture

3535 N. Classen Blvd., Okahoma City, OK 73118

Thank you to those who have already donated!

Gold Contributor: ANTHONY MCDERMID, AIA

Bronze Contributor: Fred Niggemeyer, AIA

In the summer of 2003 I had decided to pack up everything I

owned and put it in a storage

building in South OKC, and go without paying for walls, ceiling,

and a roof over my head. I had been just a couple years out of

college, and I was working for one of the Oklahoma City’s best

architecture firms. My goal was

to spend a couple of months without having to pay rent and

utility bills to save up for my first home. I was going to be a

homeless, young professional.

Those couple of months turned

into six months of camping, crashing with friends, and a

nights sleeping in my truck. Basically it was six months of

working full time while on vaca-

tion, and it was exciting. When you don’t have anywhere to live,

it is easy to find out how impor-tant it is to find a chair and more

importantly a bed. If you want

some advice on how to do something like this please ask

me how.

In that time I was homeless, I

had plenty of free time after work, and I had always been

mowing yards for extra money. It was easy for me, and besides,

where else would I be? One of my many lawns to mow was the

OKC Foundation for Architecture

project they had purchased. It was the old Church of Christ

Scientist building located at 1200 N. Robinson. It was an easy

mow and weed eat job for some

decent money, and little did I know at the time, I would be

serving on the board years later. That was how I spent my sum-

mer a decade ago.

Mowing the Church of Christ Scientist in the summer of 2003

was my introduction to OKC

Foundation for Architecture. I can remember when the founda-

tion sold the building, and not because I was serving on the

board at the time, but because the board had told me to stop

mowing the yard. A few years

after that building sold, I was asked to serve on the OKC

Foundation Board, and in 2011 I started serving as a board mem-

ber.

The OKC Foundation for Archi-

tecture, a 501 (C)(3), was cre-ated through the AIA Central

Oklahoma Chapter to help save that building I once mowed and

weeded ten years ago. The OKC

Foundation for Architecture started as a service to the citi-

zens of Oklahoma City to save that building from being van-

ished from existence, and the

Foundation has grown due to rescuing one building. The

Foundation has gone on to cre-ate a number of events and ac-

tivities that help provide public

awareness of architecture in and around Oklahoma City. These

events include KIDesign, Okla-homanMade Competition, Poker

Run, and a Scholarship Program.

In the past ten years after being

homeless, I have grown up and accomplished a great number of

things. I will not bore you with the many projects or the many

proposals both won and lost. I

have had one child, Cooper, with my wife, and we are expecting

another in early 2014. I couldn’t image going without a home

having a family, but I do know that I could if we decided or

needed to, and that is because

of the warm hearts of the fami-lies and friends we have made

before and after me going homeless.

I look forward to the next ten

years of the OKC Foundation for

Architecture. And, although I don’t plan on being homeless, I

do keep the blades sharp on that very same mower that I

used to mow while being home-

less in the summer of 2003.

Sincerely, Andrew Seamans, AIA, NCARB Chairman

Chairman’s Message

Andrew Seamans, AIA, NCARB

2014 Chairman


Are you interested in leaving a legacy? Selling a business?

Looking for a way to reduce

your taxable income or dispose of an asset you no longer want?

Or do you just enjoy helping others and want to donate to a

worthy cause? If so, the Planned Giving committee can

help you. We have a multitude

of options to allow you to donate to our organization, either now

or in the future as part of your estate. You can support

KIDesign, the scholarship fund

for students at OU or OSU and our recently developed project

to restore the Olinka Hrdy mu-rals at the new OCU Law School.

If any of these great choices don’t suit your particular inter-

ests, we can also structure an

opportunity just for you. Estab-lishing a fund with your name

(or someone else you chose) to support a specific cause can be

individually tailored through our

association with the Oklahoma City Community Foundation. For

example, if you want to honor a loved one who particularly loved

architecture and travel, we can set up a fund in their name that

provides children a chance to

travel around the world to ex-perience different styles and

periods of architecture. If you prefer to limit travel to the

United States or a different age

of participants, that is possible. The parameters can be struc-

tured by you to meet your spe-cific requirements. The possibili-

ties are endless, and we are

here to help you achieve your goals.

In upcoming newsletter articles,

we will explore the different ave-nues for planned giving in more

depth, including charitable gift

annuities, planned gifts, be-quests and charitable remainder

trusts, just to name a few. Oklahoma City is growing and

the architecture community is an

integral part of it. The mission of the Oklahoma City Foundation

for Architecture is to promote design excellence in our physical

environment through education and projects. We want to help

you make a lasting contribution

to the city and community we all serve. If you are interested, or

just curious, please contact us at [email protected] or by

calling Lisa Tippin at (405) 589-

6633.

Planned Giving

2013 Board of Trustees

Lisa Tippin

Planned Giving Chairman


Andrew Seamans, AIA

Chairman

David Pettyjohn,

Vice Chairman

Geoffrey Parks, AIA

Secretary

Jason Holuby, AIA

Treasurer

Kevin Bahner, P.E.

Trustee

Lisa Tippin

Trustee

Mike Sottong

Trustee

Bryan Durbin, Assoc. AIA

Trustee

Weston DeHart

Trustee

Anthony Blatt, AIA

Trustee

Asa Highsmith, AIA

Trustee

Melissa Hunt

Executive Director

The Oklahoma City Foundation for Architecture Week will again host its Architectural Photography, OK-LAHOMANMADE. The call for en-tries will be released in early No-vember.

The Competition is open to all Okla-homa residents and the 2014 com-petition will again feature four cate-gories: Oklahoma Licensed Archi-tects & Intern Architects, Oklahoma Students, General Public and Pro-fessional Photographers.

For more information on the OKLA-HOMANMADE Photography Compe-tition and to view all of the 2013 entries, please visit the Founda-t i o n ’ s w e b s i t e a t www.okcarchitecture.com.

2014 OKLAHOMANMADE Architectural

Photography Competition

3535 N. Classen Boulevard

Oklahoma City, OK 73118

405.948.7174 office

405.948.7397 fax

[email protected]

www.okcarchitecture.com

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Oklahoma City Foundation

for Architecture

1st Place

Architect & Intern

Architect Category

Rand Elliott, FAIA

1st Place

Oklahoma Student Catefory

Brenda Breeding

OKCarchitecture

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