Dark Star Park and the Birth of Arlington’s Public Art Program

Name: Dark Star Park and the Birth of Arlington’s Public Art Program
Start: 2026-03-12T19:00:00-04:00
Location: Marymount University

Schedule

Thu, 12 Mar, 2026 at 07:00 pm

UTC-04:00

Location

Marymount University | Arlington, VA

Arlington Historical Society presents Nancy Holt’s Dark Star Park (1979 –1984) and the birth of Arlington’s Public Art Program. AHS hosts Angela A. Adams, Founding Director of Arlington Public Art as she discusses the creation, stewardship, and legacy of Nancy Holt’s Dark Star Park and how it inspired a more than 40-year commitment to public art as placemaking. Her presentation includes screening of Holt’s film: “Art in the Public Eye: The Making of Dark Star Park.”
Angela Anderson Adams has worked as a curator and arts administrator for four decades, serving most of those as Founding Director of Arlington Public Art. Under her leadership, Arlington County’s public art program grew from one of the first developer-sponsored programs in the country to an internationally-renowned, award-winning public and privately funded program that contributes art and design enhancements to most major civic projects undertaken in the County, including buildings, parks and open space as well as infrastructure.
Adams previously served as Adjunct Curator at the National Museum of Women in the Arts, Washington, DC, and Exhibitions Director/Curator for the Museum of Contemporary Art, Arlington. She holds a B.A. in Art History from the College of Wooster, Ohio, and a M.A. in the History of Art from the University of Michigan, Ann Arbor. Adams was born and raised in Washington, DC, and Frederick, MD. Currently she splits her time between south central Vermont and Arlington’s Clarendon-Courthouse neighborhood, serves as Vice President of the Holt/Smithson Foundation and offers mentorship and consultation to the public art field.
LOCATION
We’re back at the Reinsch Library Auditorium at Marymount University’s Main Campus
DRIVING DIRECTIONS and FREE PARKING: Attendees planning to attend the event in-person should enter the Marymount University campus at the library gate on N. 26th Street. From Glebe Road going north, take a right onto 26th Street. Pass the intersection with Yorktown Road and then enter the campus through the next gate on your left. The library is to your left as you enter the campus. Free garage parking is just past the library at the bottom of the small incline. (Handicapped parking is immediately to your right as you enter through the gate onto campus.)
If the university has lowered the garage gates, push the button and let them know you’re here for an Arlington Historical Society event in the library. To leave, push the button and they’ll raise the gate.
ZOOM AVAILABLE: If you can’t be there in person, you can zoom in, but you must register by the end of Wednesday, March 11. Click HERE to register https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLSeHFkAeOxdCX2RXCUZVe05H1RzJ5FVYZU8WoXqb3uSEMFlkeg/viewform into your browser to complete your registration. On Thursday morning, Mar 12, the day of the event, AHS volunteer, Martin Suydam, will send you the Zoom registration information in an email, so be on the lookout for it.
This event is in celebration of Women’s History Month and is one of the monthly series of free public programs sponsored by the Arlington Historical Society. This event is hosted courtesy of the Marymount University politics program’s American Heritage Initiative. For more information, please email: [email protected].