NEW EXHIBIT

A new exhibit is replacing the modeling
exhibit, Little Wings . . . Big Dreams,
which has occupied the Hansen and Gorman Galleries since 2010;  Plane & Fancy:  Aviation Art in WW II. The focus of the exhibit is artwork that was
produced by and for members of the Army Air Corps during WW II.  It
includes nose art, jacket art, leather patches, paintings and prints
drawn from the museum’s collections and augmented by several loaned items.
The Gorman Gallery primarily holds contemporary artworks that depict WW II aircraft and their nose art.  There are also several original sketches by nose art artist George Rarey. 
In the Hansen Gallery are examples of original nose art, vintage leather jackets and patches.  Throughout the exhibit, every effort has been made to honor our WW II veterans by tying the objects to the people who produced the art, wore the jackets and patches and flew with the aircraft.

NORTH AMERICAN AVIATION XP-51
In 1940, the British desperately needed fighter aircraft. North American Aviation offered to create an entirely new fighter in just 120 days. The result - the P-51 Mustang - proved to be the most successful and versatile fighter of World War II. A total of over 15,000 were produced. The EAA AirVenture Museum’s XP-51 represents the prototype stage of the Mustang’s development. The fourth P-51 ever built and the oldest to survive, it is one of the Museum’s greatest treasures.

SEE US ON FLICKR

Are you curious about the collections of the EAA AirVenture Museum and the EAA Library? There is a quick and easy way to access some of these collections. Through the efforts of your museum staff and some very dedicated interns and volunteers, EAA has been able to post more than 3800 images to the Flickr, www.flickr.com, website.
The collections featured range from photographs, to EAA decals and patches, to World War II escape and evasion maps, to color aircraft paint scheme renderings, to World War II training posters. These collections represent only a fraction of the artifacts the AirVenture Museum and Library oversee.

Listed below are brief descriptions of the collections you can view on www.flickr.com.
EAA AIRVENTURE MUSEUM AIRCRAFT: 315 color, close-up images of logos, decals, artwork, paint schemes, markings and more of the more than 200 aircraft in the EAA AirVenture Museum’s collection.
EAA RADTKE COLLECTION: 1086 black and white images of civil and military aircraft taken from 1932 to 1940, including aircraft from the National Air Races.
EAA GROSPITCH COLLECTION: 210 black and white images of National Air Transport (N.A.T.) aircraft from the late 1920s up to the early 1960s.
EAA NORMAN COLLECTION: 626 black and white images of civil and military aircraft, US and foreign, covering 60 years of aviation.
EAA CONVENTION-AIRVENTURE PATCHES & DECALS: 106 color images representing EAA, IAC, VAA, Warbirds of America, and EAA chapters.
WORLD WAR II SILK MAPS: 221 color images of maps used during WW II by the military for escape and evasion from the enemy.
WORLD WAR II TRAINING POSTERS: 120 color images of posters produced during WW II by the government to educate and train the military and civilians