DEPARTMENT OF FINE ARTS
Art Gallery Series 2007-2008
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DEPARTMENT OF FINE ARTS Art Gallery Series 2007-2008 |
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The Department of Fine Arts sponsors the Art Gallery Series, hosting varied shows of two and three dimensional works showcasing local and regional artists. Exhibits change regularly throughout the academic year. The mission of the art galleries program is to present exhibitions that support and enhance the academic goals of the visual arts program at Francis Marion University, providing a non-profit institutional setting in the service of society for educational purposes. Under the supervision of the Fine Arts Department faculty, the galleries curator is committed to researching, exhibiting and interpreting for the purpose of study, objects, activities, and documents focused on the visual arts. |
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 Overview of west end of Hyman Fine Arts Center Gallery |
Art galleries are located in both the Hyman Fine Arts Center and the Smith University Center. The University Center Gallery is in the main commons area and is optimized for secure display of large two-dimensional works. The Fine Arts Center Gallery features large cases along glass walls, allowing three-dimensional works to be displayed and viewed from the outdoor breezeway as well as inside the commons serving the Fine Arts Theatre and Adele Kassab Recital Hall. A lighting grid and configurable display partitions provide a flexible gallery space for two- and three-dimensional works throughout the remainder of the gallery. Senior shows are required of all students majoring in Visual Arts. At the end of each semester, the galleries also feature works produced by students enrolled in studio art classes. These shows give students hands-on experience in selection and installation of artworks, publicity of exhibition, and external review by the University community and general public. |
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The Galleries Curator then selects among distinguished regional artists to fill out the Art Gallery Series schedule in order to have two- and three-dimensional shows changing regularly throughout the academic year. Whenever possible, gallery openings are designed to coincide with First Tuesday Arts Event concerts, a series of light and varied chamber music recitals held in the Kassab Recital Hall adjacent to the Fine Arts Center Gallery. Below
find
information about some of this season's exhibitions. Please check
the Arts Calendar for more information about
First Tuesday concerts as well as the Art Gallery Series schedule.
Gallery hours are typically 8:30 am - 5:00 pm Monday-Friday except
during summer session June 5-August 11, when hours are 8:00 am - 5:30
pm Monday-Thursday and 8:00-11:30 am Friday. |
 Portion of Student Show in University Center Gallery Cases |
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 Untitled Photograph by Walter Sallenger
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Art
Gallery Series May 22 - July 24, 2007 8:00 am - 5:30 pm Mon-Thur; 8:00-11:00 am Fri Smith University Center Gallery The Quilting Way II: Quilts by the Swamp Fox Quilters Guild The
Swamp Fox Quilters Guild was started in 1980. Its purpose is to
educate,
create, and stimulate interest in maintaining, protecting, collecting
and preserving quilts. Also, the group strives to unite members in
bonds of friendship through the shared appreciation of quilt making, The guild, with approximately 50 members, meets the first Thursday of each month at 9:30 a.m. at John Calvin Presbyterian Church, except for July. It has an annual “quilting challenge.” Yearly, it exhibits at The Columns during the Civil War re-enactment, displaying quilts and giving demonstrations. Also, it makes community service quilts for nursing homes, shelters and various civic organizations. |
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Art
Gallery Series
August 7 - September 27, 2007 8:30 am - 5:00 pm Mon-Fri Hyman Fine Arts Center Gallery Stitched! Embroidery by Fiber Artist Susan Lenz Stitched! will be an exhibition of
contemporary free motion embroidery techniques by Columbia artist Susan
Lenz featuring two ongoing but related bodies of work. One is
created
on water-soluble fabric. The other uses a burning tool. Both approaches
seek to dissolve the very ground on which the embroidery is made.
Design inspirations include aerial views of urban architecture and
cross-sectional profiles of the earth's strata. Although born and raised in the Midwest, Susan Lenz has always traveled, spending much time in Austria and Italy. These experiences have been translated into a love of textiles, textures, and cultural diversity. She has studied under several internationally renowned fiber artists from Great Britain and been juried into numerous national exhibits. With needle and thread and collage techniques, Susan hopes to convey a feeling of appreciation toward all things old and rustic as well as adorned and exotic.
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 Detail from In Box XXX |
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Art
Gallery Series August 7 - September 27, 2007 8:30 am - 5:00 pm Mon-Fri Hyman Fine Arts Center Gallery Addicted to Pots! Selected works from the Huggins Collection |
 Winter
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Art
Gallery Series October 2 - November 15, 2007 8:30 am - 5:00 pm Mon-Fri Hyman Fine Arts Center Gallery Paintings by Laura Spong A well-received, 32-page catalog accompanied her 80th-birthday exhibition. It detailed her remarkable life and career, discussed the context of that career and evaluated her art. "The other day I read the essays in the catalog again," Spong says, "and I had a hard time believing it was about me." With the commercial success came critical acclaim. The South Carolina State Art Collection acquired two of Spong's paintings, and later this year she'll be in a group show at the Greenville (S.C.) County Museum of Art. The acclaim has liberated Spong. For years she has painted with workman-like regularity, routinely keeping daily hours at her studio. For years she also has painted with a sense of urgency, not so much because of age but because those paintings don't paint themselves and she gets out of sorts if she doesn't work. To this work ethic and passion, the recent success has added new confidence, and Spong has been hitting it on all cylinders since, producing gem after gem. "I have been inspired and energized," says Spong. "I think the work is freer. It has a sense of letting loose, of just painting and not obsessing about every little line and dot." The work has changed some, without losing any of the Spong imprint. While maintaining the lyrical quality of her work and the fluid lines, Spong's paintings have become more aggressive and daring. "The breaks in the planes are sharper, the marks at times more forceful, and the scribbles more abundant and perhaps livelier. More often than before, Spong has explored an earthier, even dark pallet. More often also she has limited her pallet, even producing somewhat monochromatic paintings. "Above all, these developments suggest an increased confidence as Spong further expands her range. But, she says, sometimes they indicate her disposition. "I am not depressed, but I do feel pessimistic about the situation in the world. Still, at times I feel great hope, too. My hope comes from my faith, but when I am not in that mode, I go dark. I get into fears of the future, of losing my independence and my health, and fear about the people I love." "I think the paintings are more interesting," Spong says. "I think I am getting more layers and more depth. My biggest fear has been that I would just paint a pretty piece of cloth." |
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Art
Gallery Series
October 2 - November 15, 2007 8:30 am - 5:00 pm Mon-Fri Hyman Fine Arts Center Gallery Coastal
Carolina
Clay Guild Members Show: The purpose of the Coastal Carolina Clay Guild
is to promote and exchange knowledge and information about all
types of ceramic arts and to provide mutual support, encouragement, and
education for its community. "My inspiration for
my ideas comes from nature and its creator. In my work, I strive
for honesty in the use of material. That is, I do not try to
force the material beyond its potential, or make it do something for
which it was not intended. I consider myself a potter and not a
sculptor. Therefore, the majority of my pieces ill serve a
utilitarian purpose as well as a decorative." -- Don Johns "I make pottery
because I find the tactile experience of artistic expression in clay
exciting. The feeling of the clay in my hands and the rhythm of the
potter’s wheel can be quite therapeutic. I enjoy the experience
of the smell, sound, and energy of the kiln while firing. I
especially enjoy the comradery that the pottery community offers.My
pottery mainly consists of vessel forms. I use the potter’s wheel
as my primary means of construction. I enjoy making vessel forms
because they are an intimate part of the daily rituals of people’s
lives. This relationship between the object and person is very
important to me. I am recognized mostly for my alternative fired
pottery such as Raku and Saggar fired vessels. I draw inspiration
for these pieces from classical forms, from nature, and from fellow
artists. My goal is to strive for the highest quality in my work
as well as to continuously better myself as a professional artist." --
Brian Evans
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 Detail from Geoff Calabrese wall installation |
 Paintings by Mark Keller and Matthew
Donaldson
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Art
Gallery Series October 30 - November 19, 2007 8:30 am - 5:00 pm Mon-Fri Smith University Center Gallery Student Works by FMU Painting
Classes |
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Art
Gallery Series November 27 - December 15, 2007 8:30 am - 5:00 pm Mon-Fri Smith University Center Gallery Student Works by FMU Photography classes |
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 Intelligent Design Eve
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Art
Gallery Series January 2 - February 14, 2008 8:30 am - 5:00 pm Mon-Fri Hyman Fine Arts Center Gallery Metal by Mana Hewitt "My works explore this play on words through imagery associated with technology, evolution and architectural environments. The works are composed of multiple layered metal collages that are based on rearranged appropriated images from historic engravings. The final compositions are a mix of social commentary coupled with whimsical imagery. My goal is to create images that are aesthetically pleasing and conceptually significant, playing off the meaning of the chosen images." -- Mana Hewitt Gallery Gala Tuesday, 5 February 2008, Hyman Fine Arts Center Gallery, 7:00 pm. |
 French Villa Stairs
by N. B. Baroody
 Gallery Gala, February 2008 |
Art
Gallery Series January 8 - March 6, 2008 8:30 am - 5:00 pm Mon-Fri Smith University Center Gallery Visions of the World: Photography by N.
B. Baroody God introduced light
into the world in Genesis 1:2. Without light
there is only darkness. In photography, we use light to impact on
substance in the formation of an image. To my mind and to my eye,
therefore, light is highly spiritual and its application in the
creation of form is a spiritual metaphor of the highest order. He
created the universe and segmented time to our capacity of being. He
ordained the seasons and decorated them with oscillating beauty, each
with ownership singular to itself. As we passively participate in this
panorama of our constantly changing environment, we occasionally expose
our film and our finiteness in a futile attempt to possess the moment.
But moments like these cannot be captured or possessed for they belong
to the Eternal One from Whom they came and to Whom they do return. Our
photographic endeavors serve more the purpose of reminding us of that
brief moment in time when we actually met the Artist.
Artistic expression in photography is a paradigm. Initially, there must be some advanced knowledge of the science and chemistry of photography, as well as, of sensitized paper products in order to execute and produce the desired images. Additionally, the element of form, design, light, shadows, and substance must be creatively merged with the science of photographic images. Most importantly, however, there is the compelling necessity to manipulate all of the above placing it firmly on the foundation of thought and imaginative creativity so that the intrinsic energy that drives us all to our respective craft might be successfully accomplished. I was first exposed to the concept of previsualization by Ansel Adams at his workshop in 1980. Just as an artist creates and manipulates his painting as to its composition, color, density, design, and the expression of the image, so Adams proposed his own system whereby the photographer could do the same by exposure and processing of the negative and print. Further refinement in the creation of a fine print was received at a workshop given by John Sexton who served as Ansel Adams assistant for 5 years before Adams' death in 1983. This exhibit is presented as an accumulation of images made over 50 years of a serious love affair with photographic expression. Although prints are signed by the one who made and processed the images, their selection shown here was reviewed and approved by my most sincere and uncompromising critic, my loving wife, Margaret. Because of her critical eye for technical perfection and subject appeal, we can present this collection of images hopefully reflecting our sensitivity to a world where beauty and form respond to light and shadows. Photographic expression is enmeshed in a lifetime of common and not-so-common experiences whereby we engage in a continuum of life and its experiences. My personal journey has been constructed on a solid foundation of Christian belief and commitment. Christ stated in Matthew 6:33 that we were to "seek first the kingdom of God and His righteousness". So in photographic expression I have been attracted most by those elements in life and environment that convey beauty and truth as seen in the world created around us. Hopefully the images presented in this website may partially reflect this commitment. -- N. B. Baroody, MD Gallery Gala Tuesday, 5 February 2008, Hyman Fine Arts Center Gallery, 7:00 pm. |
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Art
Gallery Series
February 19 - April 5, 2008 8:30 am - 5:00 pm Mon-Fri Hyman Fine Arts Center Gallery Colleen
Appleton
Critcher: Abstracts
"Painting is the visual documentation of the human experience.
Expressive painting is the documentation of emotion. I employ color and
shape to express creatively my soulful interpretation of existence.
"The vibrant colors and effects of acrylic paint are the catalyst for my self-expression. I am obsessed with color. I am also fascinated by geometry, phi, energy and light. "Painting requires equal amounts of intuition and careful thought. Abstraction is the process I use to make the intangible concrete. I believe that accessing creativity and producing art is the most gratifying experience of life." -- Colleen Appleton Critcher "Everyone knows the world ain't flat. It's bumpy. "The body of work in Seen/Unseen-A Textured Life is an exploration - and celebration - of the layered and tactile nature of the everyday experiences that make up Life. A humid drive on a familiar road, the grainy melt of cheap chocolate, a bug bite... Each carries a wealth of sensory memory, an amalgam of smells, tastes, and yes - textures. "Using color, symbol, and layers of paint, reclaimed consumer throwaways and materials from nature, these paintings and sculptures attempt to distill such rich yet mundane experiences to a visual form. Each piece functions as a kind of topographical visceral map; they are intended to inform at gut level. "Many of the works may reveal surprises upon close inspection...and who can say what is buried unseen beneath the surface?" -- Angela Ketcham |
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 Self-Portrait by Megan Brown | Seated Figure by Brianna Peaslee |
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 Untitled by Beth Parker |
Art
Gallery Series April 8 - May 3,2008 8:30 am - 5:00 pm Mon-Fri Hyman Fine Arts Center Gallery Student Works by FMU 3D Classes |
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Florence
Visual
Arts Guild: New Works This multi media
exhibit of new artwork by 23 members of the Florence Visual Arts Guild
showcases the diverse artistic talents of the arts guild members, many
of whom have exhibited and won awards on a national and international
level. The guild was formed in 1983 and has had numerous exhibits
throughout the region and state. Besides exhibiting artwork, the guild
holds workshops, organizes art-related excursions, and provides a
opportunity for artists’ interaction within the region. |
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Hyman Fine Arts Center Gallery Dimensions To Arts Event Calendar Back to Fine Arts Home Page |
