July Issue 2001
SECCA in Winston-Salem, NC, to Host Three New Exhibitions
Southeastern Center for Contemporary Art (SECCA) in Winston-Salem, NC, will be hosting three new exhibits from July 14 - Sept. 24, 2001. Bead artist, Liza Lou's dazzling new work, Trailer will be on exhibition outside the front entrance to the Southeastern Center for Contemporary Art. Tom Friedman will have an exhibition of over thirty of his works from 1989 to 2000 including drawing, photographs, sculpture and site-specific installation works culled from international, private and museum collections. Finally, part two of an invitational exhibition focusing on the work of NC artists, Homegrown II: Celebrating the Arts of North Carolina will highlight the work of 18 artists in a variety of media.
"I am an artist and I want to bead the world," is a slogan used by renowned artist Liza Lou. Using hundreds of thousands of sparkling glass beads, Lou fabricates set-like constructions and props that often seem to have been stolen from a MGM production lot and magically transformed into ironic, and sometimes, unsettling statements on the American Dream. Lou has turned a 1949 Spartan Mansion Mobile Trailer into a rolling 36 foot-long, beaded, three-dimensional, film-now movie set. The scene is dark, murky, and mysterious. Who lives here and what happened inside this sparkling, confined world? Venture into Lou's world to find the answer.
Liza Lou began working with beads after a trip to Italy in 1991. Inspired by works of Renaissance masters who painted the Tuscan landscape with meticulous detail, she returned to the United States to "paint" her own landscapes using millions of colored glass beads. Her first project that garnered international attention was Kitchen (1991-95), a fabricated room where every imaginable surface and object one might find in a dreamy kitchen was completely beaded-from the dirty dishes in the sink to the curtains on the windows to the inside of the oven. The Kitchen was a dazzling display that served as heady commentary of the traditional roles assigned women while celebrating their rich contributions to society-at-large.
Liza Lou will be at SECCA on Saturday, Sept. 8 at 1pm to discuss her work.This exhibition is organized by the Southeastern Center for Contemporary Art and will travel to other venues throughout the United States.
In July of 2000, the Southeastern Center for Contemporary Art began touring the first nationally traveling exhibition of the work of critically acclaimed artist Tom Friedman. The exhibition has been wowing record-breaking crowds in Chicago, San Francisco, and Aspen and is coming home to the Southeastern Center for Contemporary Art in Winston-Salem July 14 through Sept. 24.
Friedman creates extraordinary objects from everyday materials such as toothpicks, strands of spaghetti, stolen balls, drinking straws and chewing gum. He approaches his work as an on-going investigation and seemingly has the ability to take in the everyday world as if for the first time. Throughout his work, Friedman employs the fundamental elegance of 60s and 70s art movements while pricking holes in their over-inflated hyperbole or exclusionistic tendencies. According to the exhibition's curator Ron Platt, "Friedman follows ideas - and/or materials - to their logical extremes, and by doing so creates more and more complicated creations."
This exhibition received rave reviews in such national publications as Artnews, Artforum, Details, and The New York Times. An 88-page catalogue accompanies the show. The catalogue and a new book on Friedman's work are both available for purchase in SECCA's Centershop. Friedman will present a slide lecture on his work in SECCA's McChesney Scott Dunn Auditorium at 6:30pm, July 13.
SECCA is proud to present part two of an invitational exhibition focusing on the work of North Carolina artists. Homegrown I's highly successful premiere at SECCA is being followed by Homegrown II: Celebrating the Arts of North Carolina.The exhibition includes works of 18 artists in a variety of media incluing abstract painting, fine woodworking, sculpture, photography and design.
Over 240 artists from across the state of North Carolina submitted materials for this exhibition. SECCA solicited artist recommendations from arts professionals and sent out calls of entry to art councils, art organizations, schools, and universities. SECCA associate curator Douglas Bohr, an artist himself, led the selection team along with other members of the museum's staff. In his travels, Bohr found exciting evidence of the high level of art that is currently being produced in NC. According to Bohr, "My tour of the artists' studios were, to be honest, inspiring and encouraging. It was not long into the process that I realized the high caliber of work that could be seen in the course of a day's drive in any direction".
Featured artists include: Beth Blake, Greenville; Susan Brenner, Charlotte; Beth Grabowski, Chapel Hill; Hoss Haley, Asheville; Michael Harris, Durham; Paul Hartley, Greenville; Bryant Holsenbeck, Durham; Michael Klauke, Raleigh; Andrea Lekberg, Durham: Lonnie Long, Greensboro; George Lorio, Greensboro; Bonnie Melton, Durham; Laura Ames Riley, Chapel Hill; Carl Schurer, Greensboro; Idamarie Spurr, Oxford; Bob Trotman, Casar; Anthony Ulinski, Raleigh; and Clark Whittington, Winston-Salem.
For further information check our NC Institutional Gallery listings or call the center at 336/725-1904 or email to (general@secca.org) or on the web at (http://www.secca.org).
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