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June Issue 2009
Sumter County
Gallery of Art in Sumter, SC, Features Works by David Sanders
and Sylvester Hickmon
The Sumter County Gallery of Art in Sumter, SC, is pleased to present solo exhibitions by two of Sumter's most well-known artists, David Sanders: Against the Grain and Sylvester Hickmon: Another Utopia, on view through July 10, 2009.
Both artists will show a wide variety of old and new work including painting, mixed media, colored pencil and sculpture. Karen Watson, Executive Director of the Sumter County Gallery of Art states "that the gallery is excited about presenting these artists because both have given so much to the community of Sumter, Hickmon as a longtime educator and art instructor at the gallery and Sanders as an artist, educator, and community activist. Both artists could have left Sumter to further their careers as artists, but they chose to stay (or come back) to Sumter. This is the gallery's way of giving back to them and recognizing their contributions and talent."
David Sanders received a Bachelor of Arts degree in Social Studies from Morris College in 1964. He took graduate courses in printmaking and sculpture in 1969 at the Pratt Institute in Brooklyn, NY, and attended the University of South Carolina in 1970, taking graduate courses in sculpture and studying printmaking with Boyd Saunders. In 1969 Sanders taught painting and sculpture at Morris College, and was an art instructor in Sumter School District 17 from 1970-1975.
In 1976, Sanders headed an innovative program through the SC Arts Commission where he traveled the state in a mobile unit teaching painting and sculpture in the "Arts in Prison" and "Arts in Motion" program(s). Sanders has had a long and varied career that included a stint on the Sumter County School Board in the early 70s, and he currently serves as a Sumter County Cultural Commissioner. He is one of the founders of the "Festival on the Avenue a Cultural Celebration of the South Sumter Community" now in its third year. Sanders is the Executive Director of the Manning Avenue Free Studio and Artists Coop in South Sumter, a position he has held since 1976.
Sanders' work has been included in several exhibitions including a two-man show at the Columbia Museum of Art, 1969, Benedict College, Morris College, 1995, and a three-person show at Francis Marion University, Florence, SC, 2009. His artwork can be found in many private collections. Sanders was one of eight artists who participated in the Accessibility 2006 Sculpture Symposium, an ambitious installation project that included sculptors from around the world.
Sanders offered the following statement: "Creating art is like a religion both are faith-based and driven by ritual. The recognition of the aesthetic beauty, the joy and sadness, the triumphs and failures inherent in everyday life as well as my own experiences, informs my art and affirms my passionate space on the planet."
"Color/line, light/dark, abstraction/realism; I explore and manipulate these components to create order from disorder. Sometimes these efforts result in a 'harmonious' composition, although this is less important to me than a certain freedom from the known, which opens me up to exploring the 'unknown', where that will lead and what it will reveal."
"The material I use to create art - acrylic, wood, metal, found objects, and African artifacts are signifiers that simultaneously speak to the future on a personal and global level, and honor the past and present of my community of South Sumter as well as my African heritage. Each element I work with lends itself to my ability to envision it in another form. The wood, metal and other materials become soft and pliable to place here or there, to bend, shape or carve. My works are fluid and continuous and are transformed daily into another entity and yet another entity."
Sylvester Hickmon
Sylvester Hickmon Jr., a native South Carolinian, remembers drawing on the ground as a child and later, spending every moment in the art room during his high school years. He received a Bachelor of Science degree in art education from South Carolina State University, Orangeburg, SC.
For the past twenty years, Hickmon has taught art at the High School, Middle School and Elementary school level(s). He currently teaches art at Kingsbury Elementary School in Sumter. He has taught colored pencil drawing classes at the Sumter County Gallery of Art and conducts workshops on drawing with colored pencils. Skilled in oils, acrylic and relief painting, Hickmon has worked exclusively in colored pencil for the past twenty years. Although he has recently begun to produce mixed media artworks, colored pencil is his medium of choice because of the control and detail of drawing combined with the expressiveness of color characteristic of painting. His work is characterized by his vibrant use of color, light and shadow to create realistic figurative and still life compositions.
Hickmon has exhibited
throughout the United States and his artwork can be found in many
private collections. He has received numerous regional awards
and national recognition for his work in colored pencil. His work
has been featured in The Artist's Magazine and The Best
of Colored Pencil 5. He is co-author of the book Colored
Pencil Step by Step.
Hickmon offered the following statement: "In my work I convey
brief moments and interludes in our lives and let the viewer's
individual experience and imagination recapture these 'stories'
and make them their own. Our lives are comprised of important
moments; each one lived in an instant. Such moments vanish quickly,
leaving behind memories, impressions, images, colors and feelings
that shape the routines and rituals of our everyday lives and
define our humanity."
"My recent work involves the use of fire as a metaphor for change and self-renewal. These mixed media works incorporate acrylic, colored pencil, wood, Plexiglas, found objects and collage to suggest our continuously evolving states of maturity and self-reflection. There seems to be a universal attraction to fire as a symbol of transformation and the embodiment of the elemental spirit of life. This capacity for change dwells within each of us. Renewal is both the journey and the destination, fueled by the fire of our need to grow and change."
For further information
check our SC Institutional Gallery listings, call the gallery
at 803/775-0543 or visit (www.sumtergallery.org).
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