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April Issue 2009
The University
of North Carolina at Chapel Hill in Chapel Hill, NC, Presents
Annual Student Exhibit
Each spring, the Ackland Art Museum at The University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill in Chapel Hill, NC, presents New Currents in Contemporary Art, an exhibition of works by graduating UNC-Chapel Hill master of fine arts students on view from Apr. 11 through May 10, 2009.
Marking the culmination
of a two-year program, this exhibition introduces seven emerging
artists who interpret ideas ranging from the personal to the political
in a wide variety of media, styles, and approaches. Organized
by Barbara Matilsky, curator of exhibitions at the Ackland, the
exhibit features the work of artists John Hill Jr., Gretchen Huffman,
Nestor Armando Gil, Angela Grisales, Erin Paroubek, Edie Shimel,
and Dave Sinkiewicz.
"The Ackland is pleased to present the work of these seven
exciting new artists," said Ackland Director Emily Kass.
"The ambition, maturity, and skill on display in this exhibition
are profound and impressive."
The first work that visitors encounter in the exhibition is the
cab of a 1982 International eighteen-wheeler sited on the front
lawn of the Ackland. This piece, Dave Sinkiewicz's Watchtower,
is a fascinating mixed-media installation. The interior of the
truck, which will be open to the public, is a reproduction of
the cabin of Dr. Theodore Kaczynski, known as the Unabomber. Replicas
of Kaczynski's personal possessions - including his ascetic bunk
- fill the rear of the truck, while the front holds a video mounted
in the truck's windshield, weaving together footage of roadways
in both Chapel Hill and Baghdad. This distinctive contrast in
technology represents two divergent ways in which Kaczynski could
have engaged his genius: either as a social outcast - the path
he eventually chose - or as an integrated part of society, a path
that could have directed his skills towards government sanctioned
warfare.
War is also referenced in Nestor Armando Gil's Incidents,
an elegant fifteen-foot long scroll spilling from the ceiling
to the gallery floor inked with handwritten descriptions of civilian
deaths in Iraq.
Drawing is a meditative
act for Gil, who spends countless hours "marking time"
and transcribing information culled from official reports as a
way of "bearing witness" to the tragedy of war. The
pillow upon which the artist kneels to create this ongoing calligraphic
drawing is poignantly included as a part of the piece.
A playful spirit is evoked in Gretchen Huffman's mixed-media prints
and drawings. Inspired by personal experiences, dreams, and stories,
her work is packed with visual details that enrich both the narrative
and composition. In Huffman's imaginary world, animals and humans
often become interchangeable characters that express a wide range
of emotions: awe, disgust, disbelief, and especially humor.
Fantasy and pattern are the subjects of John Hill Jr.'s intricately
detailed drawings. Using archival colored pens, Hill documents
his thoughts with virtuoso technique. Personal landscapes, densely
compressed with people, places, and "the minutia of everyday
life," are transformed into high relief when visitors don
the 3-D glasses provided by the artist.
In Erin Paroubek's oil paintings, internal and exterior worlds
converge in glowing color and textured surfaces. Canadian geese
are a favorite subject, serving as a metaphor for our inability
to grasp absolute reality. In her compositions, Paroubeck relishes
the layering of patterns, which become a stabilizing element both
visually and psychologically.
In Coppice, a black felt installation hanging from the
ceiling, Angela Grisales merges nature and the human psyche. Fascinated
by seed pods, fruits, insects, and fungi, the artist finds "beauty
in the grotesque, warmth in weirdness, and solace in mystery."
Viewers can enter an environment that is creature-like in form
but soft and inviting. Within the gallery, Grisales creates an
intimate space for quiet reflection.
Edie Shimel's black and white photographs are poignant elegies
to the cycle of growth, decay, and destruction of civilization
and the environment. Innovatively layering her own photography
with appropriated imagery from the nineteenth century, the artist
reinterprets The Course of Empire, a famous series of paintings
by Thomas Cole. Recognized as the dean of American landscape painting,
Cole was the most prominent artist to critique the destruction
of nature during the Industrial Revolution. Although Shimel's
subject matter is apocalyptic, the imagery is both mysterious
and sublime.
The Ackland Art Museum is located on the historic campus of The
University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. As an academic unit
of the University, the Ackland serves broad local, state, and
national constituencies. The Ackland Collection consists of more
than 15,000 works of art, featuring significant collections of
European masterworks, twentieth-century and contemporary art,
North Carolina's premier collections of Asian art and works of
art on paper (drawings, prints, and photographs), as well as African
art and North Carolina pottery and folk art.
For further information check our NC Institutional Gallery
listings, call the Museum at 919/966-5736 or visit (www.ackland.org).
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