dsmWeekly - September 17, 2025

By Jinessa Lewis

Nonprofit organization Iowa Resource for International Service (IRIS) will celebrate their annual International Peace Day Festival this Sunday at Mainframe Studios. The festival aims to share a story of harmony and unity through dance.

The local celebration is part of a global effort created by the United Nations. Known as International Day of Peace or World Peace Day, the UN-sanctioned holiday serves as a day for everyone around the world to stop hate and promote peace. IRIS is using this day of peace to not only spread love, but share diverse cultures with the city of Des Moines.

For 11 years now, IRIS has hosted businesses, cultural groups and international students to come and share their culture with the local community during the Peace Day Festival. While each year has music, food and art, the main focus of this year's festival is dance. Dance groups from various cultures will come to perform for the community and even teach the crowd a couple moves.

“I'm excited about the dance aspect of it because for me, there are so many ways to demonstrate culture, but dance has a special place in that it appeals to many different senses," said Del Christensen, executive director at IRIS.

The dance groups set to perform include the Hmong Iowa Youth Dance Group, Rwandan Community of Iowa, Jovenes Embajadores DSM, Love Samba Dance Des Moines, The Bosniak American Association of Iowa and Ishara Dance Des Moines, as well as a Chinese fan performance by Diana Yong Cai.

“We have dance that's tied to traditional ceremonies, cultural beliefs and celebrated occasions, so to me it's just that sweet spot,” said Christensen.

As always, vendors at the festival will be serving diverse foods, selling merchandise, showing local art, and much more. The event will also hold a silent auction for the art exhibited throughout the festival. Bids start on Friday and end on Sunday.

The festival will take place from 10 a.m. to 3 p.m. on Sunday at Mainframe Studios. The festival is free to attend with donations welcomed. For more information visit the IRIS website.

All inclusive: families, friends, and even furry pals are welcome at the fall festival. (Photo: Beaverdale Fall Festival)

BEST BET

Fun at the Beaverdale Fall Festival

The Beaverdale Fall Festival is underway this weekend, embracing autumnal traditions and savoring the sunshine (while we still have it!) The two-day festival starts on Friday with fun activities for the whole family. Some fan favorite traditions are on the festival roster, in addition to a dozen live bands, baking contests, axe throwing and much more.

The fun kicks off at 5 p.m. on Friday with a carnival and a root beer float stand, plus the Fourth annual Team Trivia Contest.

Day two begins bright and early at 9 a.m. with a pancake breakfast and power yoga, plus more fun activities including axe throwing contests and the cornhole tournament. The evening wraps up with an outdoor family movie night.

The festival is free to attend. And heads up: Streets near the intersection of Beaver and Urbandale avenues will be closed to traffic during that time. For more information, visit the festival website.

The Week Ahead

Jason Aldean, 7:30 p.m. Friday, Casey’s Center. The country star brings his “Full Throttle” tour for one big night with special guests Nate Smith, RaeLynn and Dee Jay Silver.

“Bright Star”, Friday through Oct. 5, Des Moines Playhouse. The musical by Steve Martin and Edie Brickell tells the tale of a World War II soldier who returns home with big dreams of becoming a writer.

Botany of Beer, 5:30 p.m. Tuesday, Greater Des Moines Botanical Garden. Sample different types of beer while learning the science behind it. Registration is required and participants must be over 21.

CultureALL Ball, 7 p.m. Saturday, Hilton Des Moines Downtown. Celebrate the beautiful cultures of Des Moines residents through dance, music and food in an exciting festival experience.

Step to it: The 15th annual Healthiest State Walk takes place Oct. 1. Iowans across the state are encouraged to walk for 30 minutes to highlight the importance of both physical and mental well-being. Workplaces, schools, organizations and cities can register a walk for free. Organizers created the walk as a reminder that you don’t have to be a marathon runner to take care of your health — small steps, like a daily walk or a healthier breakfast, can lead to big changes. Learn more and sign up at iowahealthieststate.com.

Counting down to Claus: Not to alarm you, but there’s only 99 days until Christmas. The Des Moines Holiday Boutique returns Nov. 7-9 at the EMC Expo Center with more than 130 vendors for jewelry, apparel, gourmet foods, decor and other unique gifts. Shoppers can also enjoy special attractions including Santa visits, live entertainment, the Holly Jolly Cocktail Bar and Shopper Relaxation Lounges. Get a head start at DesMoinesHolidayBoutique.com.

Umeri upcoming: Drake University’s alumni choir Umeri kicks off its 2025-2026 season with a performance on Oct. 5 at 2 p.m. in Sheslow Auditorium. The concert will feature 24 Drake Choir alumni, members of the Des Moines Symphony, and soloists Elizabeth Fisher, Mollie Lawler, Eric Ferring and Thomas McCargar, performing Alex Berko’s “Sacred Place” and Mozart’s “Missa brevis in F Major, KV 192.” There will be a pre-concert talk at 1 p.m. in Levitt Hall, Old Main, that will explore community, ritual and sacred spaces with insights from the choir’s conductor Aimee Beckmann-Collier and guest experts. Admission is free for both the talk and concert.

National headliners: Des Moines’ historic Ingersoll Theatre kicks off its inaugural season with a lineup of national performers. Highlights include Grammy-nominated pianist Jim Brickman with a holiday-themed show Dec. 8, Chicago blues legend John Primer & The Real Deal Blues Band Dec. 21, and Tony Award-winning star of “Jersey Boys” John Lloyd Young performing Feb. 21. Tickets for all shows go on sale Friday at 10 a.m. Dinner is available two hours before showtime for select performances.

By Dave Elbert

The Italian word chiaroscuro (pronounced kee-ah-roh-SKOO-roh) describes the artistic use of light and shadow to create the illusion of depth in paintings.

It’s also the theme of the Des Moines Art Center’s annual fundraising event, 2025 Gala: Chiaroscuro, Saturday evening at the Krause Gateway Center — the $160-million, museum-quality office building erected in 2018 across the street from the John and Mary Pappajohn Sculpture Park.

Designed by Italian architect Renzo Piano, the Krause building’s glass curtainwalls, angled roofs and open staircases give added dimension — chiaroscuro, if you will — to Kyle Krause’s private art collection.

While they may seem disconnected, the Krause Center’s location at 1459 Grand Ave., 2.5 miles east of the Art Center, is a silent reminder of the museum’s creation in 1948.

That’s because Art Center founder James D. Edmundson, pictured, added a unique provision to his gift in 1933 of $600,000 ($15 million in 2025 dollars). Edmundson’s will stipulated that the museum could not be built east of 14th Street, because smoke from the soft coal used to heat downtown buildings back then polluted the air and would ruin paintings.

Today’s Krause Center lies just outside the smoke-limited area.

The preferred location in 1933 for an art museum was on the east bank of the Des Moines River where the Embassy Suites Hotel is today. But that site was eliminated by Edmundson’s will.

More than a decade before Edmundson died at age 94 in 1933, he revealed his intention to leave a large donation to build the Art Center. Nearly a century later, the reasons for Edmundson’s gift remain enigmatic.

Edmundson was one of the Iowa Territory’s earliest citizens, born in 1838, the year the territory was formed. His parents lived in the Burlington area before moving to Fairfield, then Mahaska County when it opened to settlement in 1843. After Iowa became a state in 1846, Edmundson’s father served in the first session of the Iowa Legislature in Iowa City.

He began studying law in Oskaloosa and continued in 1860 while serving as a page in Iowa’s new capital in Des Moines. In 1866, he moved to Council Bluffs, where the bulk of his adult life was spent practicing law, investing in real estate, banking and insurance.

After his first wife died in 1890, Edmundson contributed $265,000 to a Council Bluffs hospital that was later named the Jennie Edmundson Hospital.

He remarried in 1894 and traveled the world with his new wife before settling in Des Moines in 1900. One obituary noted that throughout life, Edmundson “was passionately devoted to the best literature and, as a specialty, the correct use of English.”

The only connection I found to the visual arts was an article in a State Historical Society of Iowa publication three months before Edmundson’s death in April 1933. It noted that in 1906 Edmundson commissioned well-known American sculptor Sherry Edmundson Fry (no relation) “to fashion a statue of the famous Iowa Indian, Chief Mahaska,” which stands in the city square in Oskaloosa, in honor of Edmundson’s father.

An Art Center history written in 1984 describes Edmundson as “a reclusive lawyer, real estate investor and scholar,” but offers no hint of motivation for such a large gift.

It does, however, note that because so much of his wealth was in farmland, and because the Great Depression was underway at the time of his death, Edmundson “stipulated that his funds were to be held in trust until 10 years after his death.” By then the gift had grown to $700,000.

There were further delays because of World War II. When the Art Center was finally built in 1948 from a design by Finnish architect Eliel Saarinen, more than $1.5 million was available from Edmundson’s estate.

The selection of the world-famous Saarinen during the 1940s — and later of two other world-renown architects, I.M. Pei and Richard Meier, for additions to the original building — are stories I’ll come back to later.

Dave Elbert has covered local history and Iowa business news for more than 40 years, first for the Des Moines Register and then the Business Record. Read more of Elbert’s Backstories at dsmmagazine.com.