Our Mission: LUX Center for the Arts is dedicated to transforming lives through art. We are a community of art lovers providing education through art classes, artist in residency programs, gallery exhibitions, and community outreach. We believe the LUX can help people make meaningful connections to art regardless of who they are.

LUX Impact Video 2022

LUX Center for the Arts is truly Lincoln's community arts center, a vital resource for the visual arts in Nebraska.

The LUX offers year-round art classes for children, youth, and adults in ceramics, painting, drawing, glass, mixed media, and metals/jewelry. The quality of instruction sets the LUX apart. Classes are taught by artists/teachers in our Artist-in-Residence program, which each year brings four professional, well-educated, emerging artists/teachers to Lincoln to teach, in exchange for studio space, materials, and a solo exhibition.

Our outreach programs expand our community impact.   Our outreach program was developed to provide art-making classes and workshops to low-income school children and the elderly, Alzheimer's patients, cancer survivors, incarcerated youth, and other groups. Two outreach programs stand out – the classes we provide to four Title 1 Lincoln Elementary schools and the classes we provide to incarcerated children at Lancaster County Youth Services, supported by your donations and our community partners.

In 2021, working with VR Nebraska, we started the Art Academy – a career exploration program for youth with disabilities. We trained twelve youth in the Spring and three stayed on as paid summer interns and two of them continued as interns in the fall. Our plans are to continue this program in the near future.

The LUX holds a sterling reputation as a place to view and experience challenging, stimulating art. Recent exhibitions included artists Charley Friedman, Ryan Crotty, Nancy Friedemann-Sánchez, Gail Kendall, and more. Each month, we feature new exhibitions from local, regional, and national artists.

In August 2021, we invited seven national, international and local artists to create seven new murals and one art installation, inviting people outside to look anew at University Place and what it has to offer. Our neighbors around the LUX came out in large numbers to celebrate these new murals, giving them a chance to see how art can be transformative in their lives and in the life of a neighborhood. Through this collection of world-class murals, people of all ages and walks of life can enjoy an engaging art experience for years to come.

In 2022, we’ve begun work with our partners at Nebraska Wesleyan, First UMC Church, and the City of Lincoln to create a ‘University Place Arts District’ – part of a newly created program by the Nebraska Arts Council and the Nebraska State Legislature to encourage arts districts across the state. Our aim is to promote arts-related businesses and revitalize the 48th Street and the University Place neighborhood.

LUX Center for the Arts a is a tax-exempt 501(c)(3) non-profit organization.

History

Now in its 45th year, LUX Center for the Arts was organized as the University Place Art Center in 1977 to provide a cultural focal point for the University Place neighborhood. In 1987, the center moved to its current location, the old University Place city hall located at the corner of N. 48th Street and Baldwin. Benefactor, artist, and arts educator Gladys M. Lux purchased and donated the building for arts education purposes. In 2000, the center purchased an adjacent building and created classrooms and studios to improve its ability to offer quality programs. We honored Gladys Lux by renaming the center to reflect her generosity.

In June 2017, The LUX completed work on a parking lot and a Ceramics Center, with two new classrooms — the Lee and Debbie Stuart Foundation Handbuilding Studio and and WRK Family Foundation Wheel Throwing Studio. These new classrooms doubled the amount of classroom space at the LUX. The Ceramics Center also features a plaster room, a kiln room, a glaze room, a space for future outdoor kilns and the Steve Wake Student Gallery. Four new artists-in-residence studios were also created. In November 2018, renovation of our historic 103-year-old main building was completed, including our galleries, classrooms and offices and updating heating, cooling and electrical systems. This completed the LUX's $1.7 million renovation project. In 2017, the city gavve a historic designation to the LUX's main building. 

Together with our public, private and foundation partners, the LUX Center offers a broad range of art appreciation and educational opportunities for people in Lincoln and surrounding areas, with plans to do so for another 45 years.

Support the LUX with a recurring donation