Texas A&M Hosts Exhibition On Works By Faculty In School Of Performance, Visualization And Fine Arts
A Texas A&M University Art Galleries exhibition will celebrate creative works by faculty members in the School of Performance, Visualization and Fine Arts.
The Faculty Biennial opens March 23 and continues through May 14 at the J. Wayne Stark Galleries in the Memorial Student Center. The every-other-year exhibition dates back to 1999, when the visualization program was part of the College of Architecture. This edition is the first under the School of Performance, Visualization and Fine Arts, which debuted in September, and includes works by faculty members in the visualization and performance studies programs.
A reception will be held March 23 at 5:30 p.m. at Stark Galleries. Faculty artists will be on hand and refreshments will be served.
“This exhibition offers a wide variety of different kinds of art, both traditional and more modern forms — from digital works to interactive designs and even book binding,” said Catherine Hastedt, director of the University Art Galleries. “Visitors will see art forms they might not expect when thinking of art in general terms; the traditional fine arts will be represented with paintings, sculptures and photography, while digital works riff on video game designs and others invite visitors to engage with the installation itself.”
Faculty members and their work featured in the exhibition: Mayet Andreassen, watercolor and ink on paper; Emily Bujnoch, photography, nylon 3D prints and mixed media; Philip Galanter, artificial life artwork; Michael Gayk, fabricated pewter candleholders; Jeanne Goodman, fine book binding; Jill Honeycutt, letterpress prints; Felice House, oil on canvas; Barbara Klein, photography; Dmitri Koustov, oil on canvas; Jeff Morris, interactive music and video; Rebecca Pugh, acrylic paint and graphite; Jinsil Hwaryoung Seo, mixed reality; Michelle Simms, digital printed to canvas; Mason Smith, digital print on archival paper; Courtney Starrett, data-driven art; Krista Steinke, analog film quilt; and Glen Vigus, photography.
“The Faculty Biennial show is a great way for our faculty to showcase their latest creative works,” said Vigus, who serves as the school’s director of operations. “It’s the kind of work that doesn’t fall into typical categories associated with traditional research.”
Hastedt noted that professional artists who teach on campus add another dimension to a student’s learning, and what art can mean to them.
“When students deal directly with an actual piece of art, it’s a completely different experience than what they see in class,” she said. “You can look at a picture of the ‘Mona Lisa’ in an art history textbook, but it doesn’t compare to the experience of seeing it in person. Similarly, we all know famous works like Salvador Dali’s melting clocks (‘The Persistence of Memory’), but people are shocked to find that it’s actually about the size of a piece of notebook paper.”