PAST EXHIBITIONS
Catherine M. Pears: Atmospheric Transcendence
Catherine recently completed her Masters in Painting at Northwestern State University. She has worked in nearly every artistic field: printing, newspaper, theater, advertising, visual merchandising, freelance design, and studio art. The exhibit, atmospheric transcendence, was created incorporating techniques gathered from the historical investigation of the use of colored grounds. This created color unit-- interesting interplay with applied color-- allow for freer brushwork resulting in dynamic paintings that convey energy, atmosphere, and expression.
James Hunter: Cane River Revisited
James Hunter continues the Folk Art legacy of his Grandmother Clementine Hunter. He was born on November 18th, 1965 on Magnolia Plantation in Natchitoches Parish, Louisiana. When his father died he lived off and on with his grandmother on Melrose Plantation. Clementine Hunter taught James Hunter how to paint as he watched her for hours painting plantation scenes.
Michael Yankowski: Fabrications
Michael Yankowski has been a Professor of Art at Northwestern State University for 21 years. He is influenced by Renaissance and Surrealist artists and has studied under masters of a variety of media. Yankowski incorporates various types of wood, cast metal, ceramics, and other materials allowing a wide assortment of design possibilities. His most recent sculptures are "open constructions" which permit the viewer to enter a symbolic internal space.
Jeremy Simmons: Memory, Imagination, Observation
Jeremy Simmons is Assistant Professor of Art at LSUA. Jeremy is from the Flinthills region of Kansas. He obtained his Master of Fine Art in painting from Indiana University at Bloomington in 2003. jermy's work is primarily figurative and narrative. In this exhibit called "Memory, Imagination, Observation" he splits his efforts between these frames to collect and create a dilectical narrative.
20th September Competition
The Alexandria Museum of Art announces the opening of the 20th September Competition to be on view from August 25th through November 1. Artworks in a wide range of medium, style and subject matter will be represented.
The September Competition has the reputation of showing exciting and innovative work and is very competitive, drawing entries form all over the world.
The Alexandria Museum of Art’s competition is open to all artists over 18 years of age working in any media. All work is original, has been completed within the last two years, and is available for purchase. Paintings, sculptures, photographs, and prints are among those to be displayed.
The juror for this year’s September Competition is Peter Jones, Professor of Art at Louisiana Tech University in Ruston, LA.
Judy Bynum George “The Gift of Life”
Former instructor for LSUA and Louisiana College, North Georgia landscape painter Judy Bynum George resides in Cleveland, Georgia. A professional artist and teacher, George has synthesized her musical and artistic talents into a rich and mulit-faceted career. Her colorful “symphonies on canvas” celebrate the joys of living and growing. Flowers, mountains, trees, and streams are used as symbols to tell of her own creative journey.
TALMUD and the art of Ben-Zion & Marc Chagall
The title TALMUD is appropriate for this show that brings together the Biblical work of two of the most important Jewish artists of the 20th Century. Even though Talmud deals traditionally with text and not image, these images are commentaries on the text of Scripture in the best of the Talmudic tradition. Not only can this tradition continue as we meditate on the individual subjects of these works, but the Talmudic dialogue is also accomplished as we view the works of these two artists side by side. It is hoped that together, you and the artists will set in motion a joyous interchange of instruction and learning, perhaps even holy delight that will not fade as you leave the galleries.
ABOUT THE ARTISTS:
Ben-Zion (1897-1987). Reared by his father for the rabbinate, Ben-Zion Weiman came from Poland to America in 1920. After turning to art (and shortening his name), he became a founding member of The Ten, the 1930's avant-garde group, with Ilya Bolotowsky, Lee Gatch, Adolph Gottleib, Mark Rothko, and others. Ben-Zion's work is represented in many museums
throughout the country including the Metropolitan, the Whitney, the Museum of Modern Art in New York, the Art Institute of Chicago, the Philadelphia Museum of Art and the Phillips Collection, Washington. The Jewish Museum in New York opened in 1948 with a Ben-Zion exhibition. His Biblical Themes portfolio (1951) is complete in this exhibition.
Marc Chagall (1887-1985). The name of this artist, one of the most brilliant lights of the 20th Century art world, is forever linked with the Bible in the formation by the French Government of the Musee National Message Biblique Marc Chagall in Nice. After moving to Paris from Russia he began a suite of etchings on the Bible for Vollard in 1931. The Biblical suite was finally published by Teriade, in two volumes, in 1956. The French magazine Verve published a suite of color lithographs of Chagall's Biblical themes in a double issue, 33/34.
Four years later a larger suite, Drawings for the Bible was published in both a French edition (VERVE 37-38), and in an American edition (HARCOURT, BRACE and COMPANY, New York). This suite of prints is complete here. The 24 original color lithographs in this exhibition were printed by MOURLOT Freres, and are from the American edition. The printing was completed in Paris the 29th of July 1960. The book cover is also a lithograph specially designed for this edition.
Intrinsic Value: Works by Shawne Mayor
Born in New Iberia, LA. After living in New York City for the past decade, Ms. Major currently resides near Opelousas, LA. She received her MFA from Rutgers University and attended the Skowhegan School of Painting and Sculpture. Her work is held in private and public collections all over the country. Her works are impossibly dense blankets of remains – obsessively constructed of bits of plastic, cloth, beads, buttons, toys, and an endless encrustation of compulsively applied materials. They are the essence of bricolage, a beguiling fusion of “high” and “low” cultures achieved by changing cast-offs of our consumer society into treasure.
Bill Bryant: Watercolors
Bill Bryant has been working in watercolor for over 20 years, primarily landscape, some portraits and currently some city scapes. Mr. Bryant is known for his vibrant, expressionistic watercolors based on the American southwestern scenery. He has a BA from Centenary College, MFA Corcoran School of Art and a D.Ed from Pennsylvania State University. Mr. Bryant taught at Louisiana College for 3 years, University of Kentucky for 2 years, Morehead State University for 2 years and is a retired Professor of Art from Northwestern State University after 28 years. He is a Sig. Member of Louisiana Watercolor Society, Rocky Mountain Watermedia Society and Hoover Watercolor Society. His work has been exhibited in the Alexandria Museum of Art in Alexandria, Louisiana, Louisiana State Museum in Baton Rouge, Lousiana, George Washington University in Washington, D.C. and Centenary College in Bossier City, Louisiana.
Attack of the Red Planet Samurai
The name says it all; it conjures up lurid pulp Sci-Fi magazine covers, movie posters and Japanese monster movies. To say that science fiction has been a tremendous influence on our culture is an understatement. What began as a marginal cult literary phenomena has grown to be an enormous influence on our daily lives. It has shaped many aspects of contemporary culture. We have only to think about Captain Kirk's communicator and the cell phones we carry in our pockets to realize we are living the Sci-Fi life.
It all begins in earnest with Jules Verne, H.G. Wells and Edgar Rice Burroughs. Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea, The Time Machine and a Princess of Mars opened the floodgates of the imagination and youthful minds lapped it up and were inspired by it. In 1927 Hugo Gernsback created Amazing Stories magazine as a venue for new writers and found an audience of eager youngsters ready to consume every sentence. They saved their pennies for each new issue and they took the fantasies of the pulps and turned them into reality. They became the future Sci-Fi writers, movie directors, artists, scientists and imaginers of the future.
In 1934 Universal Pictures released the first of three Flash Gordon serials to the big screen. Starring Larry "Buster" Crabbe, the serials brought to life Alex Raymond's beautifully drawn Sunday comic strip. High adventure awaited Flash, his companion Dale Arden and scientist Dr. Hans Zarkov as they battled the minions of the evil Emperor of the planet Mongo, Ming the Merciless. Futuristic sets, ray guns, flying cities, hawkmen, cliffhanger endings and wobbly rocketships on barely concealed wires made Flash Gordon a hit with kids of all ages. Flash's influence can easily be seen in George Lucas' Star Wars films and on many of the works in this exhibition.
In the 1950s and 60s science fiction reflected our innermost fears as the atomic age and the cold war came upon us. Atomic radiation, mutants, flying saucers, aliens and pod people who looked like us but were really evil aliens devoid of all humanity flooded the bookshelves, comic racks and the movie screens. In Japan, Godzilla, Rodan and Mothra were born and spat atomic fire and wrought destruction upon the human race. Monsters were everywhere and the comics created mutants that went by names like the X-Men, the Hulk, Spiderman and the Fantastic Four. Garish movie posters screamed of Blobs, Saucermen and Humanoids from the Deep. That influence is also present in this exhibition.
Observations - The Sketchbooks, Paintings and Architecture of Errol Barron, FAIA
The Alexandria Museum of Art is pleased to announce the opening of its first exhibit of 2005, Observations - The Sketchbooks, Paintings and Architecture of Errol Barron, FAIA. The exhibit will run from January 22 - March 12, 2005.
A noted architect, painter and Professor of architecture and drawing at Tulane, Mr. Barron has for over 25 years, regularly used sketchbooks to record ideas, events and observations from daily life.
From a collection of over one hundred volumes, sixty will be shown in the exhibition along with 30 paintings and photographs of buildings that grew out of the sketches. The drawings record a number of subjects - landscapes (both European and American), buildings, objects, people and humorous cartoons providing an unusual perspective on the way ideas are gathered, on the creative process itself and on the connection between painting and architecture.
A full color catalog containing a comprehensive representation of the exhibit will accompany the exhibition with essays by Dr. Richard Gruber, Director of the Ogden Museum of Southern Art, one of Mr. Barron's projects and by Mr. Barron.
In support of our 2005 membership drive, Mr. Barron has agreed to donate an original work of art for one new member selected through a drawing. The drawing will be held at the opening reception on January 22, 2005. All new memberships purchased now until the night of the opening reception will be entered into the drawing. Memberships can be purchased at the museum or on our website.
Also showing on the first floor galleries will be Retrospective of Time: Michael Elliot-Smith. The Alexandria Museum of Art is located at 933 Main Street in downtown Alexandria, LA. Gallery hours are Tuesday-Friday 10am-5pm and Saturday 10am-4pm. For more information please contact Frances Morrow at 318-443-3458.
For more information on Errol Barron please view his Biography and Resumé.
Some samples Errol Barron's Work:
Southern Journeys Exhibit
Our second exhibit in our cultural heritage series features African American artists of the South and those influenced by the South.
Cooperative endeavor with the Southern Museum of Art.
Starr Smith Exhibit
Photography in a unique perspective of the south Inspired by some of the places and people he encountered in his travels.
Also showing: CAG Exhibit, Kid's Gallery, Permanent Collection.
Larry Leach Exhibit
Larry Leach produces works of art which transform and soothe, offering peace and harmony through a blending of coloring which nature provides him and which he proceeds to transfer, as if by magic, into haunting canvases of excitement and distinction.
The Heart of Spain
The Heart of Spain was a breathtaking exhibit which was on loan to the Alexandria Museum by special arrangement from cultural institutions of Spain. The exhibit offered some of the greatest of these works. The Heart of Spain inspired and nourished us, and came at a time when we understand what it means to reveal one's heart. Central Louisiana has been called "Louisiana's Heart." It was the perfect place to showcase this magnificent exhibit of religious antiquities on special loan to the Alexandria Museum of Art during the state's yearlong celebration of the Louisiana Purchase Bicentennial. Central Louisiana's twin cities -- Alexandria and Pineville -- are located on the banks of the Red River, halfway between north and south, halfway between east and west. Along a crossroads, this region of the state provides the chance to move at a slower pace, catch one's second wind, and discover what good things come in Louisiana's well-traveled, smaller packages.
Visit the Heart of Spain website.
