Art for All: The Cedar City Art Exhibit, 1940-2008
October 18, 2025 – March 7, 2026
In 1940, a visionary junior high school art teacher, Eugene Jorgensen, proposed the idea to initiate an annual community art exhibition featuring the work of selected local, regional, and national artists. The Cedar City Art Committee was born to coordinate this invitational show, which was hosted yearly until 2008. The Cedar City Art Exhibit is the source of many artworks acquired by Southern Utah University, now held in the collection of Southern Utah Museum of Art (SUMA); but at least one artwork was selected each year to be purchased for the city, and as the event evolved, students would save money and seek to buy art for their schools. This exhibition highlights some of the most important pieces originating in the annual art exhibit—including nationally-recognized artists like Maynard Dixon, regional favorites like Eve Drewelowe, and notable Utah artists such as Jimmie Jones—from the collections of both SUMA and the Iron County School District.
But the Cedar City Art Exhibit not only exemplifies this community’s commitment to the arts and its pride in an artistic heritage—its origins also illuminate an important moment in American history when New Deal-sponsored programs sought to bring art to all Americans. Like four other projects in Utah, the Cedar City Art Committee was initially funded by the Federal Art Project’s Community Art Center Program, which was launched to open the world of art to every citizen. The broad accessibility of art and arts education had a democratizing effect, demonstrating that art is useful and fundamental in a very practical sense. In their apparent press release from 1941, the Cedar City Art Committee encapsulated their mission—and that of all similar programs—simply and beautifully: “The art patrons of Cedar City have gone to considerable expense…to bring the exhibit and show it free to the public because they believe art is for all.”
Artwork Credit:
Maynard Dixon (U.S., 1875-1946)
Poplars and Sunlight, 1935
Oil on canvas, 29.875 x 25 in.
Southern Utah Museum of Art (1946 Cedar City Art Exhibit)