Larry Peterson

By VICKI RICE
Hub Staff Writer

KEARNEY - In Larry D. Peterson's basement studio are all the tools he needs to create works of art, but there are a few drawers in one of the cabinets that he pretty much leaves alone.

Each of his grandkids has his or her own drawer in that cabinet where they keep their crayons, paper and other art supplies.

Peterson has not only influenced his own family's interest in art but has influenced the interest of people in the Kearney community and beyond. That is why he is this year's Kearney Hub Freedom Award winner in the Arts and Entertainment category.

He taught painting more than 30 years at Kearney Sate College/University of Nebraska at Kearney, was one of five people who helped in the 1970s to found the Nebraska Art Collection at the Museum of Ne-braska Art, and has organized Kearney's Art in the Park for 31 years.

"Larry Peterson has been a driving force in bringing the visual arts to the Kearney community for more than 30 years," Pat Jones of Kearney said in her nomination of Peterson.

"Not only is he a working artist, well-known for his paintings, but he has touched the lives of many fu-ture art educators as he served as one of their art education professors at UNK."

Peterson has a list of the 1,050 paintings he has done and knows where each of them is.

He gave away 27 paintings when he retired in 2000. "A good painting is like one of your children - you don't want to lose it," he said. "But I only have so much space."

Watercolor is his favorite media. He paints mostly Nebraska landscapes, and said he is a post-impressionist painter, although "I don't like to be labeled."

Peterson said growing up near the Platte River, camping there as a Boy Scout and hunting and fishing along the river, stimulated his interest in art.

When he was in school in the 1950s, he knew he would either have to go to a large city to make it as a painter or go into teaching. He has enjoyed teaching in both public schools and at the college level, and never really considered it work.

"I felt guilty getting paid for it," he joked.

Peterson said he receives most of his support from his wife, Sherri, and his children and grandchildren.

He considers helping to establish the Nebraska Art Collection his biggest success. Only a few other states had state art museums at the time. Nebraska has the Joslyn Art Museum and the Sheldon Memorial Art Gallery, but those have different objectives, he said. At MONA, the artists have to have a Nebraska tie, whether they were born, lived, studied or worked here.

Getting the museum started wasn't easy, he said. As soon as they would clear one hurdle, there would be another one. When they started, they had no money, no art and no building.

The museum now has works by more than 400 artists, and the collection continues to grow, Peterson said.

He started Art in the Park in 1971. When he was working toward his doctorate at the University of Kan-sas in Lawrence, he saw an art show in a park there. He decided to try it in Kearney.

"I wanted to give young artists the opportunity to show and sell their work."

The show, always the second weekend in July, started with 30 artists and about 2,000 people attending. Last year the number was limited to 110 artists, with 17,000 people attending.

Eleven of his family members, including children and grandchildren, all have jobs to do to help Kearney Artists Guild members get the show ready, Peterson said.

"I was ready to give up and let someone else do it, but they won't let me," he said.

e-mail to:
vicki.rice@kearneyhub.com