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THE ARTIST REVEALED: PORTRAITS
FROM THE COLLECTION OF PETER PAONE & ALMA ALABILIKIAN Feeding a long-time fascination with artists and their studios, Peter Paone & Alma Alabilikian began collecting images of artists they admired photographed at the height of their careers, seeking out those photos which displayed "a happy marriage between the artist and the photographer." The more than forty photographs in this exhibition were chosen from that collection, and feature important 20th century artists like Edward Hopper, Piet Mondrian, Georgia O’Keeffe, and Pablo Picasso, captured on film by such famous photographers as Brassai, Lotte Jacobi, and Carl Van Vechten. This exhibition explores not only the relationship between the artist and his studio, but also the fascination of photographers with the working artist and the mystery of his creative space. [Organized by Peter Paone & Alma Alabilikian]
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THE GEORGE AND HELEN SPELVIN
FOLK ART COLLECTION As a continuation of Beauvais Lyons’ critique of museology and the authority of the curatorial “voice” found within the contemporary museum, The George and Helen Spelvin Folk Art Collection calls into question issues surrounding folk and outsider art. By acting as “curator” of this fictitious collection–one that he himself created–Lyons appropriates the mechanics of art presentation to serve a larger idea, namely that, “the mythos of folk art is based on a Romantic concept of creativity, one which is essentially anti-intellectual.” Complete with biographical information on the “collectors,” as well as biographies of each of the “artists,” The George and Helen Spelvin Folk Art Collection is a remarkable and curious foray into the nature of the creative process. The exhibition includes, among others, Lucas Farley’s enamel painted records, Arthur Middleton’s painted portraits of American Presidents, velvet paintings of brides by Charlotte Black, Max Pritchard’s hand-painted religious tracts on cereal boxes and numerous “limberjack” puppets by Lester Dowdey. [Organized and curated by Beauvais Lyons, Hokes Archives]
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THE ALLEGORICAL IMPULSE:
ART AS A MEANS FOR SPIRITUAL AND SECULAR INSTRUCTION Allegory, a means of making the “invisible” visible, is a product of the philosophical thought of Classical Antiquity in the fine arts, literature, and rhetoric. Since then, the allegorical impulse has been utilized by artists and their patrons to teach ideas as well as to establish and maintain power. This exhibition will examine this thesis through the Vanderbilt University Fine Arts Gallery Collections. Ranging from religious paintings from Vanderbilt’s Kress Collection of Renaissance art to numerous prints and sculptures, this exhibition will attempt to illustrate the range of this genre of art, while providing a context to its origins as its influence on art today. [Organized by Vanderbilt University Fine Arts Gallery]
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KINETIC DIAGRAMS: SCULPTURAL
WORKS BY JOHN POWERS The 2001 Margaret Stonewall Woolbridge Hamblet Award Winner Exhibition This exhibition features recent works by John Powers, the 2001 Margaret Stonewall Wooldridge Hamblet award winner. The Hamblet award winner is selected by a panel of outside jurors from an open invitational for graduating seniors held each spring. The award, a $17,000 grant to be used for travel and study during the year following graduation, culminates in this exhibition. With this award, Powers traveled through Western Europe to countries that included England, Switzerland, Germany and Italy. He also studied mixed-media integration and woodworking at the Penland School of Arts and Crafts in North Carolina. [Organized by Vanderbilt University Fine Arts Gallery]
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PARANIRVANA (SELF-PORTRAIT)
BY LEWIS deSOTO Paranirvana (self-portrait) by Lewis deSoto is a 25 foot long air-filled and fan inflated sculpture inspired by a well-known sculpture of Buddha at Gal Vihara in Sri Lanka. In deSoto’s sculpture, he has replaced Buddha’s face with his own. By doing so, the artist portrays both himself and the reclining Buddha at the moment of death and supreme consciousness. Although the scale of deSoto’s work initially seems, like the issue of death, large and overpowering, the fragile materiality of the work, held up only by the pressure of an air fan, denies this. Picturing his face on the Buddha, deSoto asks himself and the viewer the universal question: How will we face the moment of our death? [Organized by the Samek Art Gallery, Bucknell University]
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A WORD MADE FLESH: WORKS
BY LESLEY DILL Organized and presented at Vanderbilt as the second in a series of exhibitions focusing on significant contemporary women artists, A Word Made Flesh will utilize the Gallery’s own collection of work by Dill, while including other important pieces she has created in recent years. These works, many of them massive, large-scale, photo-based tapestries, merge images of the human body with poetry by Emily Dickinson and others literally drawn on the figures themselves. Dill uses language and the materials of cloth, thread, and paper–often stained with tea–as a means to explore the female psyche both literally and metaphorically, producing works of art that are at once profound and moving. [Organized by Vanderbilt University Fine Arts Gallery]
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SUMMER READING: ARTISTS' BOOKS
FROM NASHVILLE COLLECTIONS Reading is a particularly apt summer activity. This exhibition will present a number of artist-made books, some simply illustrating important works of literature, others that are distinct, independent works of art. Also included will be a select group of press books–those books that are produced in limited editions. Using the Fine Arts Gallery’s Collection as well as other local collections, the artists in this presentation include, among others: Oskar Kokoschka, Dieter Roth, Richard Wilson, Henry Moore, Stanley William Hayter, John Christie, Elliot Ross, Ian Tyson, Nelson Howe, Axi Leskschek, Patrick Procktor, Emmitt Williams, Ann Brunskill and Berrigan Marx. [Organized by Vanderbilt University Fine Arts Gallery]
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1997/1998 Exhibitions 1998/1999 Exhibitions 1999/2000 Exhibitions 2000/2001 Exhibitions 2001/2002 Exhibitions |
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