Austin: Calendar of Events

Adventure Tour

 Standard 1 hour 15 min tour

Experience what it was like for our discoverers of this natural treasure.

 Our experienced staff will guide you as you climb, hike, rappel and explore the natural beauty thousands of years in the making. No concrete. No handrails.

South Cavern Adventure Tour Much more than hands on. Get ready to get down and dirty. Experience a thrilling and physically demanding 3 to 4 hour excursion into one of the world’s premier caverns. Climb, crawl, rappel, explore – with only the light of your helmet to guide you. This is not for the weak of heart. Once outfitted with caving gear you'll be lowered by rope through a 160-foot well shaft. Travel approximately one mile, going down to 230 feet below surface level to the Fault Room which features one of the longest soda straw formations in North America – 14 feet in length.

Adventure Tours Experience what it was like for our discoverers of this natural treasure.

Our experienced staff will guide you as you climb, hike, rappel and explore the natural beauty thousands of years in the making. No concrete. No handrails. South Cavern Adventure Tour Much more than hands on. Get ready to get down and dirty. Experience a thrilling and physically demanding 3 to 4 hour excursion into one of the world’s premier caverns. Climb, crawl, rappel, explore – with only the light of your helmet to guide you. This is not for the weak of heart. Once outfitted with caving gear you'll be lowered by rope through a 160-foot well shaft. Travel approximately one mile, going down to 230 feet below surface level to the Fault Room which features one of the longest soda straw formations in North America – 14 feet in length. follow the path that the original discoverers took. This tour includes a half mile through wild cave and passages that have not changed since the caverns’ discovery. Total distance of the tour is 1.25 miles that begins under the Natural Bridge and follows the commercially developed path with hand rails and concrete trails. The tour then turns more adventurous as the physically challenging portion begins through the wild passage. Guests are provided with caving gear and are required to crawl, climb and slide over and through various obstacles. It’s a challenge and an experience that you will never forget. South Cavern Adventure Tour

We specialize in providing Austin in 90 Minutes —

A narrated Austin sightseeing tour that familiarizes you with over 30 of Austin's major historical, cultural, significant points of interest in just 90 minutes! This daily scheduled tour with satellite activated narration gives you a comprehensive overview of our great city. Tour departs from the Austin Visitor Information Center at 209 E. Sixth Street in downtown Austin.

Call (512) 659-9478 for reservations and information or register online

Erle Stanley Gardner's Study Leeds Gallery *Fourth Floor* Flawn Academic Center

By appointment only; phone 232-7688. This replica of mystery writer Erle Stanley Gardner's study at his ranch home in Temecula, California, displays original memorabilia and artifacts from his career. Gardner was the creator of Perry Mason.

Located 450 feet above Lake Travis, The OASIS offers breathtaking views of the Texas Hill Country and spectacular sunsets!

 Enjoy the scenery from one of the 40 plus outdoor decks, or inside from one of the enchanting dining rooms.

What are your hours of operation? During Daylight Savings Time: Monday through Thursday 11:30AM – 10:00PM Friday 11:30AM – 11:00PM Saturday 11:00AM – 11:00PM Sunday 11:00AM – 10:00PM

On Sunday join us for "Brunch at The OASIS" from 11:00am-2:00pm.

The Bob Bullock Texas State History Museum features Austin's only IMAX Theatre. This 400-seat, state-of-the-art theatre uses innovative IMAX technology to create the ultimate film experience. Unlike many IMAX theatres, ours is equipped with an IMAX projector that has both 2-D and 3-D capabilities.

 The Theatre can also show special films on a movie-quality 35mm projector. The IMAX Theatre is a fully accessible facility. With its own separate entrance, the Theatre is able to operate independently of the Museum and remains open in the evenings, with extended hours on weekends. The IMAX Theatre Lobby is a distinctive, dramatic space with a carpet pattern that incorporates native Texas flora in the design. Both the Lobby and the Theatre can be rented for special events. Click HERE for a listing of showtimes at the IMAX Theatre. There is no late seating in the IMAX Theatre. Please arrive at least 20 minutes before your scheduled show time.

Inside El Salvador April 17 - August 3, 2008

In April 2008, The University of Texas at Austin will host a major conference on El Salvador called Image Memory and the Paradox of Peace, jointly sponsored by the University's Bernard and Audre Rapoport Center for Human Rights and Justice, the Teresa Lozano Long Institute of Latin American Studies, the School of Journalism, and the Harry Ransom Center. As part of this collaboration, the Ransom Center will present the photography exhibition Inside El Salvador.

The 1979 coup d'état in El Salvador sparked a brutal twelve-year civil war. Events such as the assassination of Archbishop Oscar Romero and the murder of four U.S. churchwomen drew worldwide attention to the violence that rocked this tiny county. In 1983, 30 renowned international photojournalists on assignment for Time, Newsweek, LIFE, The New York Times, Paris-Match, and Stern contributed to a book and exhibition that chronicled the daily life of the people during the height of the civil war. The exhibition features 67 black and white photographs that depict those directly involved with the conflict, including the guerillas and the U.S.-aided army, as well as the impact upon the civilian population. The photographs are drawn from the Ransom Center's collections and were the gift of the Marlene Nathan Meyerson Family Foundation. The images are accompanied by texts written by poet Carolyn Forché.

It's Texas' Fault And We're Showing it Off!

 See Texas' most visited cave! Wonder World Park is a Texas Historical Site. The unique attractions here are entertaining and educational for the whole family. Enjoy guided tours through the nation's only earthquake-formed cave. Exit by elevator and catch a breathtaking view of the fault line's drop-off point from atop the Tejas Observation Tower. Play in our crazy Anti-Gravity House and take a train ride through the waterfalls of Mystery Mountain to meet and feed the friendly animals in the largest petting park in Texas!

open year round!

summer hours
memorial day - labor day
8:00 am - 8:00 pm

winter hours
september thru may
monday - friday: 9:00 am - 5:00 pm
saturday and sunday: 9:00 am - 6:00 pm

closed on christmas eve and day -
weather conditions do not affect our tours.

Jeremy Room is a stunning 120' deep chamber known for it's soda straws and delicate formations.
Small groups, eqch person given a flashlight for the tour.

Departs every 60 minutes, Tour duration 60 minutes - walking distance 1/2 mile

Laguna Gloria Grounded explores the lush twelve-acre grounds overlooking Lake Austin at the Austin Museum of Art-Laguna Gloria.

The picturesque formal gardens and wild places of this historical site served as the inspiration for the seventeen exhibited works. Ten featured Austin artists create art that expresses their personal connections with the landscape. Site-specific artworks, like Beverly Penn’s cast bronze botanicals and Martha Gannon’s constellation of photographs of Laguna Gloria’s flora and fauna, examine the relationship between nature and culture. This modest exhibition celebrates the grounds and revitalized historic gardens of Laguna Gloria with two-dimensional and three-dimensional works installed inside the Villa.

North Cavern Tour Departs every 30 minutes - duration 75 minutes - walking distance 3/4 mile

The most popular Tour introduces you to an underground world of natural beauty and amazement.

Scholars At Work: Books Based on the Center's Collections

 Hallway *Third Floor* Harry Ransom Center Monday-Friday, 8-5

May 24 -August 17, 2008

Sol LeWitt x2

Sol LeWitt: Structure and Line Sol LeWitt is one of the most influential figures in the history of twentieth-century art. Working in New York City in the early 1960s, LeWitt was among the many young artists who challenged the prevailing art of the time by emphasizing that the idea behind the work of art was more important than the execution. This thinking is evident in the 41 works included in Sol LeWitt: Structure and Line. Created by LeWitt between 1965 and 2006, these works include detailed ink and pencil drawings, brilliantly colored goauches, and “structures” made of wood, aluminum, and fiberglass.

Many of these works demonstrate the meticulous execution of an idea. LeWitt’s focus on the artistic concept was also instrumental in his development of wall drawings: large-scale works of art that are completed directly on the walls of galleries and other public spaces. For many years, LeWitt executed these works himself, using written instructions that he had drafted. In recent decades, a team of assistants have painstakingly applied the bands of color and meticulous lines for the works.

The First Photograph

 Harry Ransom Center Lobby   Gallery Hours (also Monday 10:00-5:00)

One of the finest pieces of the Ransom Center's Photography Collection is the first photograph which Frenchman Joseph Nicéphore Niépce produced in 1826. The 8" x 6.5" heliograph depicts a view just outside the workroom window of Niépce's estate in Gras in east central France. The image, on a pewter plate sensitized with bitumen of Judea, took a full eight hours of exposure to produce. Niépce's image forms part of the Gernsheim Collection -- an internationally-renowned photography archive encompassing the history of the medium -- which was acquired by the Ransom Center in 1964.

The Gutenberg Bible is the first substantial book printed from movable type on a printing press. It was printed in Johann Gutenberg's shop in Mainz, Germany between 1450 and 1455. The Ransom Center holds one of five complete copies in the United States.

Prints are the most frequently experienced but least understood works of art. In the history of art, and most exhibitions, the medium is usually presented in terms of its great masters, from Albrecht Dürer through Jasper Johns, or explained solely in terms of technique.

Instead, this exhibition explores the medium as a uniquely rich and largely collective system of expression--a "language"--with distinctive principles, persistent tendencies, and special processes that are shared across time and space.

 Planned to coincide with the annual meeting of the Print Council of America--the first ever in the state of Texas--the exhibition will feature around 100 of the collection's finest and most distinctive prints.

Works of L.Ray

Opening Saturday, May 24 A fascinating exhibit of butterfly and dragonfly watercolor paintings. Experience the power and beauty of his startling work in diptych and triptych form. In the McDermott Learning Center through August 16.

Argentine artist Fabián Bercic will provide a contemporary reinterpretation of the traditional Zen Garden in his site-specific installation for Workspace.

 As a critique of consumerism and the commercialization of culture, Bercic transforms the usually sacred rock garden, replacing its natural and organic elements with synthetic, day-go, plastic materials. The work, in this contemporary context, reflects the artist’s interest in product design, medieval manuscript illustrations and his own imagination, asking how one can create a meaningful Zen Garden with the materials of a late-capitalist society. The artist’s process of repetitively and painstakingly assembling his materials recaptures the traditional function and purpose of the Garden, in that the artist achieves the loss of self through these Zen actions. Conversely, it serves as a comment on disposable, industrial production. A seating area will be incorporated into the work, allowing viewers an area from which to contemplate the complex dichotomies of the Garden.