Artist Mian Situ’s “Oak Trees in Tejon Ranch” is an oil on canvas artwork that is part of The Autry’s collection. (photo courtesy of The Autry)

The Autry celebrated California Native Plant Week from April 13-17 by curating plant-related content on its website.

The California Legislature first launched Native Plant Week in 2010 to honor the 6,500 types of plants native to California, which a third of these species are found nowhere else on the planet. 

Visitors to The Autry Online learned more about plants native to California by participating in a digital tour of the Ethnobotanical Garden. The tour educated people on how to identify native plants, what makes these plants special and how to grow them.

Visitors also explored the flora collections, that are held in the library and archives, at the Autry. Cheryl Miller, Liza Posas and Christina Hummel-Colla, who are part of the library and research staff, compiled resources and information about native plants on a blog post at theautry.org/research/blog/plants-archives.

The post described how people can explore The Autry’s archives to find books, photos, and art to learn about the history of local flora.

In other non-plant related content, The Autry introduced Office Hours, a live Q&A hosted on Instagram that allows viewers the opportunity to ask experts across the field questions.  The first Office Hours featured Amy Scott, executive vice president for research and interpretation on April 16. The next Office Hours is scheduled for today with host DeLanna Studi, co-artistic director of Native Voices, from noon to 1 p.m.

The Autry also released L.A. Poets in Place: Sounds in partnership with Dryland Literature on April 17. The event was live on Zoom and had local poets engage in discussions with participants.

L.A. Poets in Place next program is on April 24. Nikolai Garcia, assistant editor for Dryland, will host discussions with poet Vane Lissette and Viva Padilla, Dryland’s founding editor-in-chief.

There are two additional exhibitions that can be seen online. The first is the installation of “Behind Bars,” which are photographs by Pep Williams from his 2017 photo series of California prisons. Visitors to the Autry Online can watch a video of Williams discussing his favorite images and what he hopes viewers take from the series.

The second exhibition, “Masters of the American West,” offers new works by top contemporary artists working in the Western genre. Visitors can view and purchase some of these works online.

For information, visit theautry.org.