Summer Solstice Celebration Friday

The University of Wyoming Art Museum will host its annual summer solstice celebration Friday, June 20, from 11:30 a.m-12:30 p.m.

This free event celebrates the longest day of the year and the official beginning of summer. Every year at exactly noon on the summer solstice, the sun shines through a solar tube in the ceiling of the Rotunda Gallery and illuminates the silver dollar that is embedded into the center of the gallery's floor. The celebration will be the day before the solstice this year, but visitors are welcome to visit the museum Saturday, June 21, to view the sun shining on the coin.

The event coincides with the art museum’s exhibition, “Starstruck: The Fine Art of Astrophotography,” which includes imagery of the sun, the moon, stars and galaxies. The galleries will be open during the solstice celebration, and visitors are encouraged to view the exhibition.

Visitors also will have an opportunity to safely view the sun's surface through astronomer Ray Martin's filtered solar telescope, which will be set up on the terrace. Martin is a local astronomer who for many years has participated in art summer solstice at the museum for many years.

For more information, call the Art Museum at (307) 766-6622 or visit www.uwyo.edu/artmuseum or follow the museum on Facebook and Instagram.

Through its Museum as Classroom approach, the UW Art Museum places art at the center of learning for all ages. Located in the Centennial Complex at 2111 Willett Drive in Laramie, the museum is open Mondays through Saturdays from 10 a.m.–5 p.m. Admission is free.