Kappa Pi: International Honorary Art Fraternity
Meredith College Art Department is proud to announce the establishment of a Kappa Pi chapter during the 2010-11 academic year.
Kappa Pi was founded in 1911 at the University of Kentucky. What originally began as a study session where students could meet to critique and review their work has now come to be the oldest Honorary Art Fraternity in the United States. Kappa Pi has grown into an international organization that fosters students studying the arts. Students that have completed a total of 12 credit hours and hold a GPA of 3.0 (on a 4.0 scale) in art classes and a 2.0 overall GPA will be eligible for induction. The Meredith chapter of Kappa Pi, Theta Alpha, was founded in 2011 and follows in the steps of the founding members; students gather to discuss their own work, participate in community events and volunteer with enriching art activities.
Click here for more information about Meredith's Kappa Pi chapter.
 |
The Annual Holiday Art Sale, November 11-12, 2011, was a great success. Thank you to everyone! A percent of the proceeds went to support the MASS grant, which provides support for committed art students and art enthusiasts. The grant (up to $1000) is designed to award projects that will advance the student's creative development in demonstrable ways. It is funded by the proceeds from the Meredith College Holiday Art Sale and administered by the MASS Grant Committee. For more information, please click here. |
Video Art and Visiting Artist: Chris Cassidy
Wednesday, Sept. 7, 7 pm, Kresge Auditorium: Lecture by Chris Cassidy (Associate Professor, Design and New Media, UNC-Greensboro) Chris Cassidy is planning a collaborative project with students this fall for his upcoming exhibition, Standing There, opening 1/29/12.
Standing There: exhibition in Frankie G. Weems Gallery, opening 1/29/12
In all of my work, I have been trying to make present the numerous screens through which an observer encounters the larger landscape. It is my contention in this work that our always already-mediated experience of our environment is inseparable from the practical difficulties of our relationship to the natural world. I am trying to create works of art as an attempt to envision place while also envisioning the compromised devices of seeing place. The subject matter is not nature in itself, but rather the interfaces, both outside and inside the viewer, through which nature is experienced and ultimately understood.
Standing There brings together a number of my projects across a wide range of media from the last half-decade or so, along with several new works created for this exhibition. All of the work engages with contemporary technology at some level, from very basic single-channel video work to more complicated works employing custom software and hardware.
Collaborative Project with Students (This will be discussed at the Sept. 7 lecture by the artist)
"I’ve proposed a collaborative project with Meredith’s students to leverage their proximity to the landscapes in and around Raleigh. I’ll be providing 100 small collecting kits, each comprised of a small plastic box and a section of a map of the Raleigh area. Students will take a single box, and travel to the specific spot on the map. Once there, each student will record two very short videos, using whatever video recording device they have access to (smart phone, handicam, digital still camera w/video, etc.) The first will be a 360° video pan of the "landscape" they find there. The second will be entirely of their own design, in response to the specific location they’re visiting. Finally, each student will collect actual physical samples (leaves, earth, detritus, etc.) from the site, enough to fill the small plastic box. We’ll gather together all of the filled boxes and all of the video footage by the end of November. I’ll then assemble the footage into an interactive composite view of Raleigh, controlled by a physical interface built from the collection boxes. The composite video will be projected within the gallery, and viewers will be able to “control” the playback by touching, opening or closing the boxes."
Presenting the 2010 Colton Review
The Meredith College Department of Art would like to present the 2010 Colton Review. The journal is designed in the Department's “Book Design: Colton Review” course.
Copies of the journal can be found in various locations across campus including the Cate Center, Joyner Library, Gaddy-Hamrick Art Center, among others.
This year's journal was designed by Sophia Cipriano (art director), Rachel Aydlett (assistant art director), Ashlee Johnson, Courtney McIver, Emily McKenzie, and Shonta Wicker. The literary staff includes Erin Huber (editor), Amber McKinney (assistant editor), Anna Perry, Nina McManus, and Patricia White. The journal is advised by graphic design faculty member and creative director Dana Gay and English faculty member Suzanne Britt.
For more information, or to receive a copy, contact Dana Gay, Associate Professor of Graphic Design, Department of Art, 113 Gaddy-Hamrick Art Center, gayd@meredith.edu.
Dana Gay wins the 2010 Library Faculty Award
Dana Gay, Associate Professor of Graphic Design, was honored on Thursday, March 11, 2010, at the 2010 Friends of the Library Membership meeting with the 2010 Library Faculty Award for her exemplary support of Meredith's Carlyle Campbell Library.
Dana has worked on several projects with the library including an identity design, tote bag design (which garnered a “Best in Show” award for the publicity/PR Swap & Chat at the North Carolina Library Association Conference), and poster designs, among other projects.
Ann Roth featured in News and Observer Article
Ann Roth, gallery director and adjunct teacher in the Art Department, was featured in a recent News and Observer article. When not at Meredith, Roth devotes time to her own art—hand-dyed and woven wall textiles. Read the full article.
Johnstone's Work Featured
Mary Shannon Johnstone, Associate Professor of Art, has been selected for several juried art competitions across the country (Seattle, WA, Philadephia, PA and Fort Collins, CO). These highly competitive competitions were juried by award winning photographers and art curators, including photographer Debbie Fleming Caffery, and curators Karen Irvine and Andy Adams. In addition Johnstone's work is currently on display in three different exhibitions throughout the Triangle, including her solo exhibition MILKBONES, which is on display in Raleigh in the Artspace's lobby through the end of March.
www.shannonjohnstone.com
Alumnae Art Exhibition Featured in News & Observer
An exhibition showcasing the artwork of Meredith College alumnae is featured in the March 23 issue of The News & Observer.
Visit to read the article.
Visual art has been a mainstay of the curriculum since Meredith’s beginnings in 1891, and this exhibition provides a glimpse into the talents and accomplishments of its alumnae as well as the evolution of the art department. The show features 65 works, including an oil painting by Eleanor Layfield Davis, ’32, and proceeds through each decade ending with an oil painting by Hannah Costner, from the class of 2009.
The exhibition continues through April 4 in Meredith's Johnson Hall Rotunda Gallery.
Jane Terry’s Remember Selected for the 2009 Dallas Video Fest
Jane Terry’s Remember was screened at the 22nd Dallas Video Festival held November 5–8, 2009. The critically acclaimed Dallas Video Festival features cutting-edge work by regional, national and international video artists and is currently the largest video festival in the United States.
In this short narrative by Terry, a woman’s childhood memories are pieced together to form an unsettling vignette of her mother’s emotional struggle during the post war years of suburban life in the South.
Art Sale Succeeds!
On November 20–21, the Meredith College Art Department held its first Holiday Art Sale. Available for sale were affordable works of art made by Art Department students and faculty from all disciplines, including painting, drawing, photography, fibers, graphic design, ceramics, and sculpture. Although organized by the faculty, the sale was primarily staffed and operated by the students.
The goal for the sale was to improve the professional growth of our students as well as a generate interaction with the community. Most of the proceeds went to the artists, but a portion has been set aside to fund grants for independent student art projects. There was a strong turn out on both days, and the sale far surpassed all expectations. The details and requirements for applying for grant funds will be released early in the spring semester.
We greatly appreciate those who were able to come and join us this year and hope to see all of you next fall!
Congratulations to Shannon Johnstone!
Shannon’s sabbatical project, "Breeding Ignorance", was selected as one of the Top 50 in Photolucida's highly competitive 2009 Critical Mass photographyreview/competition. "The aim of Critical Mass, and all Photolucida programming, is to provide participants with career-building opportunities and to promote the best emerging and mid-career artists working today." Photolucida's 2009 Critical Mass received almost 600 applicants from around the world. Initially a panel of 20 curators and photo professionals narrowed down the field to the top 175. The top 175 then went on to be reviewed by 200 gallery and museum directors, curators, photo editors, publishers, etc. They voted on the work and narrowed down to the Top 50 candidates, which Shannon is a part of. Great job, Shannon!
At the 2009 Southeastern College Art Conference in Mobile, James Boyles was given the Award of Distinction for his service as editor of the SECAC Review.
This year he also chaired a panel on American art history and gave a paper, "The War at Home: John Rogers' Returned Volunteer and Industrial Change in America."
Pinhole Photographers Eric Renner and Nancy Spencer Lecture Oct. 5
Eric Renner and Nancy Spencer, renowned pinhole photography advocates, will speak at Meredith College on October 5. The lecture, “Pinhole Photography: History to Contemporary,” will be held at the Gaddy-Hamrick Art Center, room 137, at 8:00 p.m.
Renner is the author of the book Pinhole Photography: Rediscovering a Historic Technique. Renner and Spencer are coeditors of the Pinhole Journal.
Renner and Spencer have exhibited their work internationally and received many awards, including a grant from the National Endowment for the Arts and a grant from the J. Paul Getty Trust.
Photojournalist and Photographer Gerd Ludwig to Give Lecture
Meredith College is hosting an evening with internationally acclaimed photojournalist and National Geographic photographer, Gerd Ludwig. Ludwig's lecture, "A Great Photograph Touches the Soul and Broadens the Mind", will be held at Jones Auditorium Thursday, October 15 at 6 p.m. The lecture is free and open to the public thanks to the generosity of Canon USA and the Canon Explorers of Light Program.
Ludwig’s photography captures beautifully all the complexities of life. Whether documenting children born with severe birth defects or the sweetness of an embrace, his photography resonates with the full scale of human emotion.
On assignment for National Geographic Magazine since the late 1980s, he has covered diverse locations around the globe—from the ecological disasters of California’s Salton Sea to the origins of the Grimm Brother’s Fairy Tales in rural Germany; from Tasmania’s remote beauty, to Toronto’s multi-ethnic society. He is best known, however, as the magazine’s front man in the former Soviet Union.
His lecture presentation will span his life’s work, from his art school days in Germany to recently published and unpublished images of Russia’s warp-speed transformation from communism to runaway capitalism—marked by bold aspirations, poignant suffering, and glittering opportunity.
Each image adds a new piece to the eternal puzzle called Russia—by turns greedy and generous, stoic and exuberant, suspicious and sympathetic—and it is evident why these stunning, complex, and provocative images have garnered Ludwig’s distinction as the world’s foremost color photographer documenting this region.
Roberts Presents Paper in Alabama
Faculty member Eva Roberts presented a paper entitled "Word:Meaning/s" during a general session at the University and College Designers Association (UCDA) 5th National Design Educators Summit Design for the Common Good. Hosted at Spring Hill College, the summit was held May 28–30 in Mobile, Alabama.
Hyde's Orchids and Clay in Current Exhibit
In a current exhibit at the South Carolina Botanical Gardens, avid “artist/naturalist” and Meredith art instructor, Warner Hyde has found an exciting opportunity to combine his two loves―cultivating orchids and crafting clay.
It is his intent that these two subjects inform each other in a balanced manner. The ceramic forms are created from indigenous clay and their unglazed surface is the result of a ten hour wood/salt firing process. The forms are reflective of the orchid’s indigenous growing habits. The forms and surfaces recall the limestone cliffs in Vietnam where lady slippers (paphiopedilum) are found dangling, or the texture of a rough tree in the canopy of the South American jungles where a cattleya orchid rests.
While the forms stand on their own, as do the orchids, Hyde believes a compelling presentation and understanding of both are achieved when presented as one together.
Instructor Experiences First Diving Trip
Faculty Member Eva Roberts experienced sea-life below the surface in Honduras this summer for a first-ever scuba diving trip.
Roberts took diving lessons in Raleigh and then completed the open water portion of her instruction on Cayos Cochinos, an island off Honduras in a national preserve. Roberts enthusiastically reported that "it was an amazing experience!"
Summer in the Southwest Arts Program and Upcoming Exhibition
The Art Department sponsored another arts program to New Mexico and Arizona in May, 2009. Linda FitzSimons and James Boyles were co-directors and instructors for both the Spring class, Southwestern Art, Culture and Histories in Context and the summer course, Summer in the Southwest Arts Program. Twelve students participated and were joined by one other faculty member, Lisa Pearce. Our base was Santa Fe for a week from which we made many day trips as well as exploring Santa Fe. Then we traveled west into central New Mexico and eastern Arizona.
Highlights from the travel program included the remote and beautiful mesa of Tsankawi, Bandelier National Monument and cliff dwellings, the unbelievable hoodoo rock formations of Tent Rocks, Georgia O’Keeffe country at Ghost Ranch, the swirling red rocks of Canyon de Chelly, the lunar landscape of the Painted Desert, and the historic and mysterious Chaco Canyon.
We visited Tesuque, Santa Clara, Cochiti, Zuni and Acoma Pueblos in addition to the Navajo Nation. We also went to numerous galleries and several museums including the Museum of Indian Arts and Culture, the Spanish Colonial Museum, the Folk Art Museum and the Hispanic Cultural Center. On the last day, we had the opportunity to visit and talk to the award-winning wildlife and nature photographer, David Cramer, and go with him to meet and photograph the wild horses that live in the hills beside his neighborhood in Placitas, New Mexico. Two quotes taken from reflective papers sum up the experience:
“Whether we were going to museums and galleries, meeting the craftsmen
in local pueblos, or traveling the rough terrain, we were always learning.”“I am blown away! Today was my favorite, even though I say that everyday!”
An exhibition of participants’ culminating notebooks and reflective art projects will open Sunday, September 13, 2–4 p.m. and will remain open through Sunday, October 11. Come visually follow our wonderful experiences in the Southwest and see art projects that reflect our inspirations.
Farewell Party for Sharon Hill
The Art Department had a farewell party for Sharon Hill on Wednesday, August 5, hosted by Ann Roth. Sharon, who taught at Meredith for seven years and served as Department Head last year, moved to San Diego, California with her husband, Tom Sherry. Tom received a promotion from Aramark and a transfer to the West Coast. Sharon was presented with a print by Cameron Johnson entitled, “Mingus.” We are sorry to see both Sharon and Tom leave Meredith College, but now we have a good excuse to go to San Diego. We wish them the best in their new home, and they will be greatly missed.
