University Art Gallery

Sewanee’s University Art Gallery and Department of Asian Studies are pleased to present North Korean Images at Utopia’s Edge, an exhibition of woodblock and linoleum prints from the collection of Nicholas Bonner, an acclaimed documentary filmmaker who has been traveling to North Korea for the last 15 years. Dr. Stephen Goldberg of Hamilton College will open the exhibition on Friday, December 4th at 4:30, with the guest lecture “At Utopia’s Edge: From Social Realism to Socialist Realism in China and North Korea.” The talk will be followed by a reception. On February 4th at 7:30 there will be a screening in the gallery of the documentary “Crossing the Line.” The film, produced by Bonner, tells the story of James Dresnok, a U.S. army defector still living in North Korea. The exhibition will run through February 14th, 2010.

The prints included in North Korean Images at Utopia’s Edge were created by several different artists over a span of more than 20 years. All are visually striking examples of Socialist Realism – easily understood artworks that proclaim and reinforce socialist ideals. These prints do not represent scenes of military glory. Instead they present visions of a North Korean secular paradise, a concept at the center of DPRK (Democratic People’s Republic of Korea) narratives since the foundation of the state. Visitors to the exhibition will see dramatic scenes of technological innovation and construction, idealized views of rural life and food production, and images of men, women and children happy in their social roles.

North Korean Images at Utopia’s Edge was organized in association with the Korea Society. The Korea Society is a private, nonprofit, nonpartisan, 501(c)(3) organization that is dedicated solely to the promotion of greater awareness, understanding and cooperation between the people of the United States and Korea. Send correspondence to: The Korea Society, 950 Third Avenue, Eighth Floor, New York, NY 10022. For more information, please visit www.koreasociety.org.

The presentation of North Korean Images at Utopia’s Edge at Sewanee: The University of the South was made possible by support from the Freeman and Henry Luce Foundations.

Please note that the gallery will not be open during Winter Break, December 18th, 2009 through January 18th, 2010.

Sewanee’s University Art Gallery presents Nowcasting, an installation created by the collaborative group TEH. It will be on view in the University Gallery from October 9 – November 22, 2009. There will be an artists’ talk and reception on Friday, October 23rd at 4:30 pm in Convocation Hall, immediately adjacent to the University Art Gallery.

Visitors to Nowcasting will experience the building of a digitized storm in the confines of the gallery. Like TEH’s other works, this installation is intended to “challenge the senses through the use of simulation, and present weather / environment through mediated, virtual and physical processes.” Entering a gallery space transformed by sound, visitors will question the reality of what their senses tell them about the surrounding environment. Continue Reading »

Sewanee’s University Art Gallery presents Cloudmapping: Paintings by Julie Püttgen, on view from September 4 – October 4, 2009. There will be an artists’ talk on Friday, September 25th at 4:30 pm, followed by a reception. The video animations will be screened on Friday, October 2 at 6:00.

The Cloudmapping exhibition in being presented in conjunction with Unless & Until, A Collaborative Project by JS van Buskirk, James R Carlson, Matt Gilbert, and Julie Püttgen. Alongside Püttgen’s mixed media paintings, the gallery space will be enlivened with audio recordings, musical interludes, and video animations inspired by the narrative that emerges from the Cloudmapping series. Püttgen describes how the Cloudmapping paintings inspired her to initiate the Unless & Until collaboration: “Partway through making the Cloudmapping series of paintings, I realized they alluded to some narrative unknown to me, and asked Stephanie [JS van Buskirk] whether she’d be interested in writing text related to the images. She agreed. Jim then expressed an interest in composing music to expand the collaboration, and the project was born.” Continue Reading »

The University Art Gallery at the University of the South, Sewanee, will close the 2008-2009 exhibition year with a selection of work by Sewanee’s senior art majors. dislocation will open on Tuesday, April 21st at 4:30 pm with two artists’ talks and a reception.

The six graduating art majors that will be featured in this exhibition are: Claiborne Buckingham, Tyler Cooney, Lo DiFiore, Elizabeth Frierson, Robert Parker, and Lane Turbeville. DiFiore and Turbeville will each present their work in artists’ talks at the reception. The title dislocation refers to the fact that, visually, each artist in this exhibition deals with the removal or transformation of context in his or her work. This act of removing or re-appropriating context becomes a means for close examination of the forms or environment presented in the artwork, forcing a reappraisal of the given reality.
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Sewanee’s University Art Gallery presents Lauren Kalman: Gilded Affections, on view from February 13 – April 12, 2009. This exhibition will open on Friday, February 13 at 4:30 pm with an artist’s talk followed by a reception.

Lauren Kalman is a goldsmith and multi-media artist currently living and teaching in Providence, Rhode Island. Through her art, Kalman hopes to affect social thought and question traditional values by creating objects and images that are unconventional in their relationship to the body. The Gilded Affections exhibition pairs two groups of Kalman’s recent work – Hard Wear and Projection. In both series, Kalman employs traditional goldsmithing techniques often employed for jewelry making to create gold “adornments.” She uses photography, video and performance to document her process and the physical relationship between these objects and her own body. Continue Reading »

Sewanee’s University Art Gallery presents Sometimes I Settle for a Chuckle: New Work by Greely Myatt, on view from December 5, 2008 – February 8, 2009. This exhibition will open on Friday, December 5th at 4:30 pm with an artist’s talk followed by a reception. Please note that the gallery will be closed for winter break from December 18 – January 12.

A native of Mississippi, Greely Myatt is a sculptor and art professor based in Memphis, Tennessee. He has gained renown throughout the Southeast for his public art pieces, narrative installations and playful takes on everyday objects. Craftsmanship and mastery over materials are key to Myatt’s work, but he believes they must be accompanied by engaging ideas. He writes, “As a native of the rural South I have a tremendous respect for work that is made by hand and guided by the heart and eye. But I also understand the importance of the mind in the process. To state my approach to the making of art in the simplest and most direct manner, I have tried to use these – the hand, the eye, the heart and the mind.” Continue Reading »

Sewanee’s University Art Gallery is proud to present an exhibition of new work by Hamlett Dobbins, a Memphis based painter and curator. Hamlett Dobbins: Every One, Every Day will open on Friday, October 24th at 4:30 pm with an artist’s talk followed by a reception.

Dobbins uses his studio practice as a way to process impressions from visual culture and daily life that stick with him and trigger an emotional response. He writes that when he was a child “Legos were a way for me to create whatever I could imagine, and I am still doing that now only with paint instead…I use painting to focus on an experience and to wrap myself in the moment. By building the experience I begin to understand what about the moment moved me to paint in the first place.” Continue Reading »

Have you been wondering what all those gurgling and humming noises coming out of the gallery are? Now’s your chance to find out! Greg Pond will give a lecture on his installation Userland[s] on Friday, September 19th at 4:30pm. For more on this exhibition, read the previous two posts.

The University Art Gallery at Sewanee: The University of the South opens its Fall 2008 exhibition season with the multi-media installation Greg Pond: Userland[s].

Userland[s] consists of a portable sound station housed in a wooden sculpture with multi-channel sound pieces generated using the programming software Pure Data. The sounds generate an alternating expanding and compressing sonic landscape with various kinds of manipulated waveforms through granular synthesis and other techniques. Continue Reading »

The University of the South presents

A New Media Symposium

With exhibitions and events exploring the intersection of visual art, sound art and computer science

August 29 – 30, 2008

Featuring:
Stephen Vitiello
Greg Pond
Althea Georgelas

University Art Gallery, Nabit Art Building and St. Luke’s Chapel
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