“IS SYRACUSE READY FOR YOKO ONO AND JOHN LENNON?’’

Yoko Ono is bringing her work back to Syracuse this summer for a show at the Everson Museum of Art.
The museum is planning for Ono to attend this year’s show and to perform in at least one of the pieces, said Elizabeth Dunbar, executive director and CEO. But it’s too early to promise that Ono will appear at the show, which opens Aug. 31.
“We hope she will be here,’’ Dunbar said. “We are planning that she will be here. But until we get a little closer to the date, we’re all kind of waiting to know for sure.’’

At a concert featuring Ono’s compositions in March, the artist arrived in a wheelchair.
“Yoko Ono: Remembering the Future’’ will run through Oct. 27, taking up nearly the full interior of the Everson and some outdoor space, Dunbar said. Curated by the Everson’s D.J. Hellerman, the retrospective exhibit will feature works from Ono’s career up to the present, including some works from the 1971 show.

That 1971 show occurred during a tumultuous time, and it met with strong reactions.

For one, there were rumors the Beatles would reunite in Syracuse. John Lennon, accompanied her to Syracuse. Ringo Starr and other celebrities showed up to help John celebrate his birthday during the event, but there was no reunion.
Some 6,000 people visited the 1971 museum show on opening day.
“That evening the doors to the Everson were broken down because people had heard there’d be a secret Beatles concert at the Everson,” former museum employee David Ross recalled in a 2005 interview. "The entire museum was filled with people furious that it had been canceled, and we were afraid they’d trash the place. (Poet Allen) Ginsberg calmed them down.’’
The New York Times covered the art show opening, leading off with the question, “Is Syracuse ready for Yoko Ono and John Lennon?’’ The Everson “sees itself as a bastion of the avant‐garde set down in a cultural wasteland,’’ the newspaper reported.
The editorial board of the The Post-Standard dismissed the show, accusing the Everson, then just three years old, of peddling “hokum’’ just to lure Lennon to Syracuse and attract attention.
Lennon and Ono wrote a letter to the paper in reply, mocking the editorial board as “Blue Meanies.’’