Two former students of the late Professor Gay Burke’s have extended her legacy of photography education to the next generation. Andy Meadows (MFA 1994), who now works as Arts Education Specialist for the Alabama State Department of Education where he distributes grants to schools and works to improve arts education in Alabama, founded the Booker T. Washington Magnet School Photography program in 1995 at the then Carver Creative and Performing Arts School in Montgomery. Starting out with the unheard of budget of $20,000, Meadows outfitted a darkroom equal to many college-level darkrooms of the time. Since then, hundreds of students at “BTW” have learned the art and technology of film and digital photography, as well as what Meadows thought was just as important: how to run a photography business. Over the years, photo students at BTW have won national, regional, state and local awards and recognition, including National Scholastic Art and Writing Gold Key Portfolio awards, National Scholastic Art Award’s American Visionary Awards and an Alabama State Council on the Arts Visual Arts Achievement Statewide Exhibition, among others. Since 2009, Emily Thomas — first a student of Meadows at BTW and then a BFA major in photography (2004) under Gay Burke — has led the photo program, until a devastating fire at BTW in August, 2018 destroyed most of their equipment. Since school started this fall, Thomas has been teaching photography from BTW’s temporary facility at Hayneville Road Elementary School. Meadows said that among the losses were $250,000 worth of, in some cases, irreplaceable darkroom equipment, cameras and photo supplies that he and Thomas collected over two decades. Fortunately, the students aren’t starting back to school with nothing. Most of their digital work was stored in “the cloud,” and some film photos had been digitized and backed-up. And, the students have a strong legacy of skilled art instruction as one of their top resources. When the students visited UA in October en route to exhibiting their photos at the Kentuck Festival of the Arts, they were upbeat about the future. Thomas said that she wants to pass on what she learned from her photo teacher — the courage to try out new approaches. Maybe that’s just the thing to help them get back on their feet: “Gay taught me that experimentation is part of making art. Sometimes it results in a success, sometimes it results in a complete failure, but you never know until you try.” If you would like to contribute to Booker T. Washington Magnet High School’s fund, monetary donations can be made to the FAME Foundation with the designation, “BTW Photography Magnet”: https://www.btwfameboard.org. And, they have an Amazon Wish list of equipment they need: https://www.amazon.com/registry/wishlist/2ISQHK4RJ2QY4/ref=cm_sw_em_r_mt_awwl_s_qvygCbT8XR0NN
Gay Burke Memorial Fellowship in Photographic Arts
The Alabama State Council on the Arts announces the creation of the Gay Burke Memorial Fellowship in Photographic Arts for individual artists living in Alabama. Applications are open January 2 through March 1, 2019. Apply online at http://www.arts.alabama.gov/grants/howtoapply.aspx. Over four decades, photographer and professor of art Gay Burke developed a distinguished art photography program in The University of Alabama’s Department of Art and Art History, all the while creating her own artwork. Burke died May 1, 2017 after inspiring generations of photographers, artists and educators. Through a generous gift, the Gay Burke Memorial Fellowship in Photographic Arts was established in 2018 to provide Fellowships to Alabama photographers to advance their artistic careers. Applications will be accepted between January 2, 2019 - March 1, 2019. The selected artists will be announced in June 2019 with their fellowship period effective October 1, 2019 - September 30, 2020. $5,000 cash awards are made to individual artists in the photographic arts based on merit of work, career achievement, career potential and service to the state. This fellowship provides awards to recognize artistic excellence as well as professional commitment and maturity and contributes to the further development of the artist and the advancement of his or her professional career. Fellowships are competitive. Quality of work and professionalism as determined by samples of work and narrative are particularly important. Provide samples of the highest quality work completed within the last five years. Eligibility: All Fellowship applicants must be legal residents of Alabama for a minimum of two years prior to the application deadline, and are expected to maintain residency during the grant award year (Oct. 1 -Sept. 30). Artists who have previously been awarded any ASCA Fellowship are eligible to apply for a second Fellowship six years after their first Fellowship. After an artist has received two Fellowships, they are no longer eligible to apply. For more information about all the Fellowships offered by the Alabama State Council on the Arts, go to http://www.arts.alabama.gov/grants/howtoapply.aspx. To read more about Professor Gay Burke, go here: https://art.ua.edu/tag/gay-burke/ Download the flyer.
UA Alumna’s Work at Ogden Museum of Southern Art
Photographs by Celestia “Cookie” Morgan (MFA 2017, photography) are included in the Ogden Museum of Southern Art’s current exhibition “New Southern Photography,” curated by Richard McCabe up through March 2019. The show was written about in the New York Times‘ “Lens” blog and featured one of Morgan’s photographs. Morgan’s work was also featured in the 2017 exhibition, Contemporary Alabama Photography, at the Mobile Museum of Art, also curated by McCabe, who is curator of photography at the Ogden. Images from Morgan’s MA exhibition, Passage, were chosen by McCabe to be in the Mobile show. Read more about Morgan's previous exhibitions here… For more information about UA’s Department of Art and Art History’s degree programs, go to this page: https://art.ua.edu/academics/
UA Alumnus Creates Giant Working Kaleidoscope
Ever had a sudden urge to peer through a giant kaleidoscope? Now you can! The latest permanent public sculpture, titled simply Kaleidoscope, is designed and built by UA art alumnus and foundry specialist Eric Nubbe, and has been installed by UA Art Foundry at Snow Hinton Park in Tuscaloosa. Commissioned by Tuscaloosa PARA, the seven-foot-high aluminum sculpture is a working, interactive kaleidoscope, perched at the northwest corner of the park. Since kaleidoscopes are shaped like a simple tube, Nubbe decided to make the massive optical instrument more interesting, so he chose the shape of a sextant - another viewing instrument which sailors have used to navigate the seas for hundreds of years. The kaleidoscope looks northwest into the sky over Tuscaloosa and the mirrors inside the kaleidoscope reflect whatever the skies look like on that day. In many kaleidoscopes, loose pieces of colored glass inside the tube are mirrored into symmetrical and colorful patterns as you turn the scope. Nubbe decided to add something similar to his. Instead of just looking up into refracted reflections of the sky, viewers look through translucent blue Plexiglas gears that Nubbe cut [on?]. When visitors look into the viewer, they rotate a disk just to the right of the scope, and the disk turns the blue gears inside, creating beautiful blue patterns across the sky. Eric Nubbe's Kaleidoscope is part of a Public Art Project commissioned by the Tuscaloosa County Parks and Recreation Authority to put art in parks around Tuscaloosa County. Giant steel flowers created by student artists Ringo Lisko and Amber Daum were installed last year in Monnish Park as part of the same project.
UA Art Presenters Hail SECAC Meeting Success
The University of Alabama was well-represented at the recent national conference meeting of SECAC held in Birmingham October 17-20, 2018. Faculty, students and alumni of the UA Department of Art and Art History presented research and chaired sessions at the annual meeting of one of the largest art conferences of its kind in the US, hosted by UAB's Department of Art and Art History and nicknamed "SECAC Y'all." UA art faculty who gave presentations were Dr. Wendy Castenell, Jonathan Cumberland, Dr. Jennifer Feltman, Dr. Kate Kocyba, Giang Pham, Dr. Rachel Stephens and Dr. Doris Sung. Bryce Speed and Dr. Stephens chaired sessions. A PARTICULAR ACHIEVEMENT Of special note was art history graduate student Morgan Heard, who presented her research paper, “‘May the Points of Our Needles Prick the Slaveholder’s Conscience:’ Women’s Abolitionist Needlework and the Anti-Slavery Fair,” in a session titled “Historic American Painting.” Dr. Rachel Stephens, who introduced Heard to the topic through Stephens’ course, “Slavery and American Art,” pointed out that it was a particular achievement for an MA student to present research. “SECAC is a friendly conference and inclusive of scholarship at all levels,” however, Stephens added, “more often, it is advanced PhD students who participate at SECAC.” Heard said that this was her first time presenting at a conference of this scale. “Although I was nervous, I enjoyed being able to share my work and receive feedback and encouragement from those who attended.” Heard’s research probes the little known work of anti-slavery women in producing abolitionist items to sell at anti-slavery fairs. These handmade objects, she asserts in her research, became important signifiers of early female activism within a domain (sewing) that was considered appropriate for women during the antebellum period. Heard became so interested in the topic that she decided to make it the focus of her thesis research. UA ART ALUMNI Several UA art alumni also participated in the annual art conference. Recent graduate Reed O’Mara (BA 2017, double major in German and economics, minor in art history) presented “Strasbourg’s Prince of the World as Political Foe and Sinful Suitor.” Last year, as a UA graduate student in medieval art history, O’Mara won a competitive Barbato Fellowship in art history to Case Western Reserve University in Cleveland, Ohio, which awarded her a graduate assistantship with a full tuition scholarship and stipend. National conferences often bring new friends and colleagues together. Rachel Stephens met presenter Laura Lake Smith, a UA art history major from 2000. A recent Ph.D. recipient from the Lamar Dodd School of Art at the University of Georgia, Smith presented "An Origin in Absentia: Richard Tuttle’s First Work" at the conference. She is currently visiting lecturer and teaching associate at Coastal Carolina University. Other alumni presented research in a wide array of subjects, including Amy Feger (MFA 2012), whose work was selected for the 2018 SECAC Juried Exhibition, which was juried by Peter Baldaia, head of Curatorial Affairs, Huntsville Museum of Art. Corey Dzenko (MA 2007) presented "The History of Graphic Design as a Discipline: Surveying Student Responses to Curricular Changes;" Jenny Fine (BFA 2006, photography), chaired a session and presented research titled "Time as Material;" Michelle Moseley-Christian (MA 2000, BA 1997, art history) chaired a session and presented "Hairy Female Bodies and the Early Modern Wild Woman in Visual Art;" and Raymond Gaddy (MFA 2000, painting) co-presented with Ashley Waldvogel, "Are You Vulcan’ Kidding Me? Mythology Everywhere." SECAC, formerly known as the Southeastern College Art Conference, promotes the the study and practice of the visual arts in higher education and is now the second largest national organization of its kind. This year's conference, hosted by the University of Alabama at Birmingham, is the first in Alabama since 1986 when the annual meeting was held in Tuscaloosa. For more information about The University of Alabama’s programs in studio art and art history, go here: https://art.ua.edu/academics/.
Johnny Goodwin
Gay Burke's former student Johnny Goodwin's work is included in the exhibition Butterfly Effect: Honoring the Legacy of Gay Burke, at the Dinah Washington Cultural Arts Center in Tuscaloosa. Johnny Goodwin (MA 1999 photography; BA 1997, history and studio art) earned his MFA and Ph.D. in 2005 in studio art and photography from the University of Memphis. Below is his artist statement: Photography has been the means for me to create and give visual “proof” to an alternative reality. It has also been a way to preserve what becomes altered with time and memory. I feel my photographs are captured moments, giving emotion and life to subjects that are sometimes seen as abandoned places or inanimate objects. It is with the “magic” of photographic manipulation, both in the darkroom and with digital technology. The exhibition will run in conjunction with Gay Burke: The Mother of Alabama Art Photography, an exhibition of 40 works by Gay Burke in The Arts Council Gallery, Oct. 5-26. The University of Alabama Gallery is located at the Dinah Washington Cultural Arts Center, 620 Greensboro Avenue, Tuscaloosa, AL. Hours are Monday–Friday, 9 a.m.-noon and 1 – 4 p.m. on weekdays and noon – 8 p.m. on the first Friday of the month. For more information about The University of Alabama’s programs in studio art and art history, go here: https://art.ua.edu/academics/.
Andy Meadows
Gay Burke's former student Andy Meadows' work is included in the exhibition Butterfly Effect: Honoring the Legacy of Gay Burke, at the Dinah Washington Cultural Arts Center in Tuscaloosa. Meadows co-organized with ASCA Deputy Director Elliot Knight. In 2015, Andy Meadows (MFA 1995, photography) accepted a position at the Alabama State Department of Education in the Instructional Services division as the Arts Education Specialist for the state, a resource support person for all teachers in the state who teach theater, music, dance or visual art. He sits on the Board of Trustees for the Alabama School of Fine Arts and the boards of the Alabama Alliance for Arts Education and the Arts Education Leadership Team (a partnership between the Alabama State Department of Education and the Alabama State Council on the Arts). Meadows created the Art Photography Program at Booker T. Washington Magnet High School and was recruited in 2010 by Mountain Brook High School to run their Art Photography program. The exhibition will run in conjunction with Gay Burke: The Mother of Alabama Art Photography, an exhibition of 40 works by Gay Burke in The Arts Council Gallery, Oct. 5-26. The University of Alabama Gallery is located at the Dinah Washington Cultural Arts Center, 620 Greensboro Avenue, Tuscaloosa, AL. Hours are Monday–Friday, 9 a.m.-noon and 1 – 4 p.m. on weekdays and noon – 8 p.m. on the first Friday of the month. For more information about The University of Alabama’s programs in studio art and art history, go here: https://art.ua.edu/academics/.
Four UA Alumni Selected for Wiregrass Biennial
Art works by UA art alumni Anne Herbert, Meredith Knight, Rachel Ann Wakefield and Tom Wegrzynowski have been selected for the B18: Wiregrass Biennial, whose exhibitors are among the "most talented and engaging contemporary artists living and working in the Southeast." The annual juried exhibition opened July 19 during the Wiregrass Museum's Art After Hours reception and runs through September 29, 2018. Anne Herbert (MFA 2013) begins her fourth year teaching in the visual arts department of the Alabama School of Fine Arts in Birmingham. Along with the B18, she has a solo exhibition at the Hoover Public Library in September and October, her work was chosen for Art of the South at Crosstown Arts in Memphis, TN, and she is part of the group exhibition, Unnatural Response: Contemporary Art by Claire Lewis Evans, Anne Herbert, Kelly Parvin, and Kelly Shannon, at Mississippi University for Women. Additionally, Herbert coordinated the UA Graduate Alumni Exhibition at the Dinah Washington Cultural Arts Center in Tuscaloosa, which runs through Sept. 28. Her art website is http://anneherbertpaintings.com/home.html. Meredith Knight (MFA 2014, BFA 2011) serves as coordinator for Birmingham Museum of Art’s studio programs in the BMA’s education department. Knight has taught art through the Alabama Prison Arts + Education Project, co-directed the Black Belt 100 Lenses program and taught art at the Montgomery Museum of Fine Arts, as well as to middle and high school students. At the Birmingham Museum, Knight writes, "I get to teach classes and work with artists who share their passion for art with visitors. I balance working at BMA with maintaining my own active studio practice in my studio in Avondale. I feel lucky to be able to do both - my studio practice informs my work at BMA and my interactions with colleagues and students, and the great collection at the BMA inspires my studio practice." Knight's work is also included in the UA Graduate Alumni Exhibition in Tuscaloosa through September. About her sculpture in B18, Knight writes, "Meter is a sculptural abstraction that explores the multifaceted nature of reality. The form references an architectural element moving and twisting through time, suggesting an ongoing search for equilibrium by articulating a stream of moments." Rachel Ann Wakefield (BFA 2014, sculpture and painting) works as a painter and graphic designer in Northport, Ala. About her painting, See, which was selected for the B18, she says, "It is part of a conversation that I have been having through my work on 'Southern Realism' - a depiction of emotions and experiences. Often I represent this realism through the use of a figure emerged in a body of water. One thing that you learn in the South is that being in water is good for the soul. It’s something that we are born into this world of, and we gravitate towards when we need peace." Tom Wegrzynowski (MFA 2006) works in his studio and teaches studio and art history courses at The University of Alabama. The piece that was selected for the B18 was The Death of Caesar, part of his Lucky series of paintings, which examines aspects of culture. Wegrzynowski has exhibited recently at Jonathan Ferrara Gallery in New Orleans, Contemporary Arts Center in Las Vegas and Transmission Gallery in Oakland, Calif. He has also presented solo shows at the Malone Gallery at Troy University (Troy, Ala.) and the Sarah Moody Gallery of Art in Tuscaloosa as well as two man shows at the Bagwell Center for Media and Art in Knoxville, Tenn. and the Meridian Museum of Art in Mississippi. Jurors for the B18 Wiregrass Biennial were Elizabet Elliott, Curator of Programs at the Mobile Museum of Art, and Jackie Clay, Director of the Coleman Center for the Arts in York, Ala. In addition to the B18, museum visitors will be able to see LETTERS etc., an exhibition by another UA art alumnus, Clayton Colvin (MFA 2005). For more information about UA Department of Art and Art History programs, go here: https://art.ua.edu/academics/.
Photography Students of Gay Burke Honor Her Legacy
Butterfly Effect: Honoring the Legacy of Gay Burke October 5-26, 2018 Reception: Friday, October 5, 5–8 p.m. The exhibition Butterfly Effect: Honoring the Legacy of Gay Burke features the work of more than 20 artists who studied under Professor Gay Burke over the course of Burke's 42-year career teaching photography in the Department of Art and Art History at The University of Alabama. Burke passed away in 2017. An opening reception will be held on First Friday, October 5, 5:30-8:00 p.m. The opening will be a homecoming and reunion for Gay Burke’s students and colleagues. Former students Elliot Knight and Andy Meadows identified twelve former students of Gay Burke's spanning the years from 1973 until Gay’s retirement in 2015. Each artist was asked to invite at least two additional photographers to participate. The exhibition will feature work that the artists created during their college years learning from Gay, as well as work they created more recently. The exhibitors include Sarah Ann Austin, Barbara Lee Black, Wanrudee Buranakorn, Breanna Conley, Kathleen Fetters, Jenny Fine, Karen Graffeo, Johnny Goodwin, Ad Kanyalak, Elliot A. Knight, Jim Lockhart, Kristen Mance, Kathryn Joy Mayo, Andy Meadows, Sarah Cusimano Miles, Michael E. Palmer, Ben Rigsby, Laura Shill, Wayne Sides, Emily Thomas, Terrell Taylor and Jerri Wilson. The exhibition will run in conjunction with Gay Burke: The Mother of Alabama Art Photography, an exhibition of 40 works by Gay Burke in The Arts Council Gallery, Oct. 5-26. The University of Alabama Gallery is located at the Dinah Washington Cultural Arts Center, 620 Greensboro Avenue, Tuscaloosa, AL. Hours are Monday–Friday, 9 a.m.-noon and 1 – 4 p.m. on weekdays and noon – 8 p.m. on the first Friday of the month. For more information about The University of Alabama’s programs in studio art and art history, go here: https://art.ua.edu/academics/.