Works by Carrie Mae Weems, 12 painters shown at BGSU

BOWLING GREEN, O.--The work of noted African American artist Carrie Mae Weems and 12 contemporary painters will be featured in two exhibitions Aug. 28-Sept. 28 at Bowling Green State University’s Fine Arts Center.

Weems, who is internationally known for her compelling visual images and text, will speak on campus Sept. 6. The 7 p.m. presentation in 115 Olscamp Hall will be followed by an 8:30 p.m. reception in the Willard Wankelman Gallery, where her photographs will be on display.

Gallery director Jacqueline Nathan frankly admits it’s a "real coup for the University to get such a remarkable artist to visit our campus," and says the solo exhibition will showcase how the photographer focuses her attention on issues of race, gender and class. Titled "Mirrors and Windows," the show will include "Kitchen Table Series," completed in 1990, as well as the more recent works "Not Manet’s Type" and "Framed by Modernism," both done in 1997.

A graduate of the California Institute of the Arts in Valencia, Weems earned her master of fine arts degree at the University of California in San Diego. She has also studied folklore at the University of California at Berkeley. Her work has been seen throughout the nation, including other solo shows this year at the Zora Neal Hurston National Museum of Fine Arts in Eatonville, Fla., and at the Parrish Art Museum in Southampton, N.Y.

Writing for Arts Magazine, Calvin Reid noted, "(Weems) immerses her work in the vernacular systems of black American culture…(capturing) the sense of existential serenity more often associated with the Blues. That is to say, the work captures the sense of an ability to face down the chaos of life whether delivered by man…or fate–with a little help from family and friends and a steadily inward, self-examining, perfectly measuring gaze."

Opening the same day in the Dorothy Uber Bryan Gallery across the hall from Weems’ solo exhibit will be "Personal Space: Twelve Contemporary Painters."

Bowling Green School of Art faculty members Dennis Wojkiewicz and Charles Kanwischer have curated the exhibition, which features artists working in traditional genres yet using a contemporary approach to painting still lifes, figures and landscapes.

Kanwischer describes the painters’ collective works as pictures that celebrate the provisional character of our surroundings. "They require us to look and look again, to be attentive to change both large and small, physical and conceptual," the BGSU professor notes.

The artists represented include Anita Dawson of Columbus; Deborah Morrisey of Cincinnati; Katherine Kadish of Yellow Springs; Elaine Pawlowicz of Chicago; Charles Pompilius of Royal Oak, Mich.; Sarah Schuster of Oberlin; Eddwin (cq) Meyers of Skokie, Ill.; Bob Paulson of Cobden, Ill.; Gwen Strahle of Dayville, Conn.; Anthony Fisher of Newton, Mass., and David Gloman and Katy Schneider, both of Northampton, Mass.

Gloman and Pompilius will speak on campus Sept. 21 in back-to-back talks beginning at 5:30 p.m. in 204 Fine Arts Center. A reception will follow at 7 p.m. in the Dorothy Uber Bryan Gallery. A panel discussion with the artists and curators about traditional subject matter in contemporary painting will be presented at 1 p.m. Sept. 22 in 204 Fine Arts Building.

The artists’ presentations and both exhibitions are open to the public free of charge.

Hours for the exhibitions, made possible with support from the Ohio Arts Council and the University’s Ethnic Cultural Arts Program,Gallery, are 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. Tuesday through Saturday and 1-4 p.m. on Sundays.