Terrifying monsters of all shapes and sizes have overrun the city of Tuscaloosa! Termed the "Monster Takeover," official reports verify that UA art students were heavily involved in the invasion of bronze handmade monsters, stationing their terrifying, but usually tiny, metal miscreations in key locations around town. Track them down at your own risk! Multiple locations in downtown Tuscaloosa are the sites of Monster Takeover, an extension of the Monster Makeover program established by the Tuscaloosa News in 2010. Combining the creative talents of local elementary school children and UA students, the Takeover features bronze sculptures placed at various locations in downtown area. Monster Takeover used the same process as the original program, but the artists were all students in the Department of Art and Art History at The University of Alabama. The UA students’ works, based on past Monster Makeover participants, were all sculpted and then cast in bronze, under the direction of Professor Craig Wedderspoon. Placed in various locations throughout downtown Tuscaloosa, the monsters are now on public display. Junior BFA major in sculpture, Ringo Lisko's sculpture, inspired by the art of elementary student Lawson Kelly, is on the I-beam at Harrison Galleries, 2315 University Boulevard, overlooking the sidewalk. Lisko is also co-creator of the Monnish Park sculpture, Amaryllis, with Amber Daum. Said Lisko, “I am very excited to be a part of Monster Takeover, especially since I got to be in on the very first wave of monsters to go up around town. It was a great experience working with the kids’ drawings, and trying to do justice to their awesome imaginations. I’m also thrilled to be adding to the public art of Tuscaloosa. I strongly believe that public art is an integral part of a well-rounded and lively community, and I hope that these monsters help to keep that momentum going!” Recent BFA graduate Kalypso Homan's sculpture, inspired by the art of elementary student Lili Gann, is at the corner of University Blvd. and 23rd Street. Sophomore double major in art history and English Sarah Murphree's sculpture, inspired by the art of elementary student Natalie Nelson, is located on 6th Street and 23rd Avenue (Water Collection?) under the park bench. UA Student Maddie Kennedy's sculpture, inspired by the art of elementary student Jordyn Green, is located near the Light in Government Plaza. Senior BFA major Jenn Gault's sculpture, inspired by the art of elementary student Sally Poole is at the Dinah Washington Cultural Arts Center on the corner of Greensboro Avenue and 7th Street. Gault has a concentration in sculpture and ceramics with a minor in anthropology. Senior BFA major Jonathan Lanier's sculpture, inspired by the art of elementary student Ryan Zheng, is located in Five, on 6th Street, above the bar. UA graduate student: Josh Dugat's sculpture, inspired by the art of elementary student Denny Stuffel, is located near Babe’s Doughnuts on the corner of University Blvd. and Greensboro Avenue. Senior double major in New College and studio art Megan Fletcher's sculpture, inspired by the art of elementary student Megan Roberts, is at the Government Plaza 6th Street entrance pillar, crawling toward the plaque. Sophomore art major Zane Boyd's sculpture, inspired by the art of elementary student Dai’Quan O’Neal, is located at the Bama Theatre, 600 Greensboro Avenue. For more information about the UA Department of Art and Art History academic programs, go here: https://art.ua.edu/academics/.
UA Art Foundry Casts Sculpture Across Alabama
Towering steel flowers, a massive mathematical loop-de-loop, larger-than-life baseball players and renown university presidents are just a few of the projects, supervised by Professor of Art Craig Wedderspoon, that have been created in the giant work bays at UA's art foundry. From Tuscaloosa to Gadsden, sculptures from the foundry find homes around the state. It takes skill and determination, caution and daring to see complex design projects grow from drawings and models to finished public sculptures. Wedderspoon and his team – foundry specialists Eric Nubbe, Joe McCreary and Ringo Lisko, with senior arts technicians Patrick O'Sullivan and Mike Eddins – work with strict safety standards and an inventiveness that keep all the machinery running smoothly behind those gigantic sliding garage doors on Margaret Drive. Now, a monumental new sculpture, cast in the foundry, is ready to become part of the Woods Quad Sculpture Garden. Mobius and Borromean Rings is designed and created by marketing major and studio art minor Paget Kern. Kern, who has taken sculpture courses for her art minor and makes jewelry at home, designed the work in a collaborative project with students in the departments of Math and Art and Art History. She linked two complex mathematical ideas together in a massive sculptural example. Kern explained that the design is “a triple Möbius strip tied together in a Borromean knot.” We’ve all seen the three inter-linked rings of a Borromean ring or knot. A Möbius strip can be made by twisting a strip of paper and adhering the ends together to create a continuous circle that is “unorientable.” If you walked along a center line on the loop, you would go around the Möbius strip twice before coming back to its starting point. The long and the short of it is that you’ll have to go see the sculpture for yourself when the giant twisted loops of welded steel sculpture are installed in the Woods Quad Sculpture Garden this summer. Up north in Gadsden, alumnus and staff member Eric Nubbe's public sculpture, commissioned by Walnut Gallery on behalf of the Gadsden Public Library, has been installed in the green space in front of the library. Just in Time is 7 feet high, 5 feet wide, 7 feet long and made of steel. Nubbe is working on a second sculptural project for the City of Florence’s bicentennial celebration to be fabricated in the foundry: a 20-foot steel musician overlooking the Tennessee River. Past projects of the foundry include a statue of past UA president and UA System Chancellor Robert Witt in Presidential Plaza on UA campus; the nine-foot tall statue of Willie Mays in Regions Field; student-designed and -built bicycle racks in Alberta Park and downtown Tuscaloosa; Amaryllis and accompanying park benches by undergrads Lisko and Amber Daum in Monnish Park; and iron benches for Schoolyard Roots (Druid City Garden Project); among others. The most intensive upcoming projects are related to Tuscaloosa’s and Alabama’s Bicentennial celebrations in 2019. They were competitive commissions awarded to Tuscaloosa artist Caleb O’Connor, Wedderspoon and the foundry. For the state’s commemoration, O’Connor designed sixteen 3-foot by 2-foot high relief bronze panels depicting scenes from Alabama’s history to be cast at the foundry and paired with sixteen interpretive text panels. The entire work is scheduled for unveiling in Montgomery in December of 2019, so mark your calendars! For more information about the UA Department of Art and Art History and its programs, visit this link: https://art.ua.edu/academics/ or contact the department at (205) 348-5967.
A New Year, A New “Phase” in Art and Music
Phase has been rescheduled with a new date and time. This Wednesday evening, January 31, from 6:00 to 9:00 p.m., experience a multi-sensory art and music performance, Phase, at Sassafras Park in Tuscaloosa. Two UA art alumni, sculptor and UA instructor Jamey Grimes and artist Malcolm Smith will create site-specific installations in the park. Sound Art will be presented by the group Tohu Va (Michael Harp and Aaron Dues). Phase is a semi-monthly community art event sponsored by Sassafras Center for Arts and Environment. The event was postponed due to rain on Sunday; weather conditions are expected to be much better on Wednesday, and Jamey Grimes says, "Phase now coincides with the full moon!" Sassafras Center for Arts and Environment is located at 3228 Loop Road in Tuscaloosa. For more information and weather updates, go to the Facebook event page: https://www.facebook.com/events/2008995622680943/
UA Students Give Rare Tour of Historic Home
Sunday, April 30, UA art history students will give special public tours of Lyon Hall, a historic Greek Revival home in Demopolis, Alabama. Talks on the historic architecture, art and decorative arts in the home will begin at 2:00 pm and occur every twenty minutes until 5:00 pm. Under the direction of UA assistant professor Dr. Rachel Stephens, five art history students have engaged in a semester-long study of Lyon Hall, built in 1852. To research the home, they were given access to the Lyon family archives, which have remained largely untouched since the mid-nineteenth century. The tours and talks are the culmination of research by student guides Laura Wymer, Olivia Turner, Amy Smoot, Jamie Reschke and Lauren Eich. Lyon Hall, owned by the Marengo County Historical Society, is not usually open to the public, so this will be a rare opportunity to view this historic home and learn about its inhabitants. Refreshments will be provided. The event is free and open to the public. Any donations received will benefit the preservation of this historic landmark through the Marengo County Historical Society. For more information about art history and other degree programs in the UA Department of Art and Art History, go to our website.
Kentuck Artists Exhibit Work at UA Gallery
The works of eight Kentuck studio artists will be displayed through Thursday, May 25, at The University of Alabama Gallery in the Dinah Washington Cultural Arts Center in downtown Tuscaloosa. The gallery will hold a reception for the exhibit, “Collaborate, an Exhibit Featuring Kentuck Artists,” Friday, May 5 from 5:30 to 7:30 p.m. The exhibit and reception are free and open to the public. There will be approximately 60 works featured in a variety of mediums, from painting and sculpture to weavings and home furnishings. The eight artists include: Steve Davis Davis of Sunheart Metalworks is a self-taught metalsmith, who brings to life ferrous and non-ferrous metals using a variety of contemporary and traditional techniques. Sunheart commissions include Westervelt Gardens, Children’s Hands On Museum, the UA Arboretum and downtown Northport streetscape projects. Sydney Gruber Gruber was born and raised in Memphis, Tennessee. She began as an alchemy artist who restored gently used furnishings to give them new life. Her specialty is in revitalizing and rejuvenating the mundane with vibrant swirls and patterns of paint. Kerry Kennedy Kennedy’s first love is pottery and sculptural ceramics. She received the MFA from UA in ceramics and has thrown pottery for over 10 years and makes primarily functional pieces. She is deeply interested in works that fuse thrown forms with organic aesthetics. Lorrie Lane Lane is an improvisational realist painter whose subjects include flowers, birds’ nests, garden landscapes and portraits. She has participated in shows such as Artsclamation!, The Brentwood Show, and the Huntsville Art Museum Galas, and she also has had solo exhibits in Nashville, Tennessee, and upstate New York. Lane was born in upstate New York and graduated from Smith College. Daniel Livingston Livingston specializes in raku and has won multiple awards at festivals across the country. His work is represented in private and corporate collections throughout the United States, England, France, Japan and New Zealand. He received the BFA and MFA from UA and is a former instructor of ceramics there. Terrell Taylor Taylor was born in Union, Mississippi, and grew up in various states throughout the South. Terrell has a background in art and anthropology, and her works, which vary from prints, paintings, sculptures and more, are often inspired by Southern life. She received the MA in art from UA. Jessica Tuggle and Andrea Moen Tuggle and Moen are weavers with Weaving Alabama. Together they use three floor-looms at the shop to create hundreds of yards of handwoven fabric. The UA Gallery offers a year-round schedule of exhibitions of artistic works, artifacts and textiles and other media from permanent collections held by UA as well as works by faculty, students and guest artists and designers. The gallery is at 620 Greensboro Ave. in downtown Tuscaloosa and is open from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. Monday through Friday and until 8 p.m. on the first Fridays of the month. For more information, phone the gallery at 205/345-3038 or 205/342-2060. The gallery is part of UA’s College of Arts and Sciences, the University’s largest division and the largest liberal arts college in the state. Students from the College have won numerous national awards including Truman, Rhodes and Goldwater scholarships. Contact Info: Karen Kennedy, kfkennedy@ua.edu, 205-345-3038, The University of Alabama Gallery, 620 Greensboro Ave, Tuscaloosa, Ala.
Artist Lecture: George Hunt
Memphis-based artist George Hunt will offer a lecture on his prolific career on Tuesday, March 28 at 7 p.m. in Gorgas Library 205. Hunt is one of the artists featured in the Paul R. Jones Gallery’s current exhibition, Freedom?, through April 28. For more information contact Stacy Morgan, smorgan@ua.edu, (205) 534-3882. UA Event calendar page: https://www.ua.edu/events/event/38008. Press release about the exhibition here: https://www.ua.edu/news/2017/01/guest-curator-ua-faculty-open-freedom-at-paul-r-jones-gallery/ There is also a facebook event page: https://www.facebook.com/events/402743140103256/
UA Gallery Hosts UA/UAB Joint Faculty Art Exhibit
In an unprecedented event, the work of art and art history faculty from The University of Alabama and the University of Alabama at Birmingham will be displayed from Friday, Aug. 5 to Friday, Sept. 30 at the UA Gallery in the Dinah Washington Cultural Arts Center in downtown Tuscaloosa. The public is invited, free of charge, to attend the exhibition and opening reception, which will be held Friday, Sept. 2 from 5 to 8 p.m. in the gallery. “We have two really great programs—and we’re in the same system—but we’ve never collaborated together,” said Craig Wedderspoon, a UA professor of sculpture. “And, we wanted to change that.” The show will include the work of 22 artists, from printmakers and painters to sculptors and more. Though Wedderspoon doesn’t know whether this exhibit will become an annual event, he said he hopes it will spark more collaborations with other art departments in the area. “We want to be more integrated with the schools in the rest of the state and region,” Wedderspoon said. The University of Alabama Gallery offers a year-round schedule of exhibitions of artistic works, artifacts and textiles and other media from permanent collections held by UA as well as works by faculty, students and guest artists and designers. The gallery is at 620 Greensboro Ave. in downtown Tuscaloosa and is open from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. Monday through Friday and until 8 p.m. on the first Fridays of the month. For more information, phone the gallery at 205/345-3038 or 205/342-2060. The gallery is part of UA’s College of Arts and Sciences, the University’s largest division and the largest liberal arts college in the state. Students from the College have won numerous national awards including Rhodes and Goldwater scholarships. Participating artists in the upcoming event include: UA UAB Adrienne Callander (fibers) James Alexander (ceramics) Jane Cassidy (digital media) Doug Barrett (graphic design) William Dooley (painting and drawing) Douglas Baulos (drawing and bookmarking) Jason Guynes (painting) Gary Chapman (painting and drawing) Chris Jordan (digital media) Derek Cracco (printmaking) Sarah Marshall (printmaking) Stacey Holloway (sculpture) Matt Mitros (ceramics) Lauren Lake (drawing) Giang Pham (studio foundations) Elisabeth Pellathy (new media) Pete Schulte (drawing) Sonja Rieger (photography) Sky Shineman (painting) Erin Wright (graphic design) Bryce Speed (painting) Craig Wedderspoon (sculpture) CONTACT: Courtney Corbridge, communications specialist, College of Arts and Sciences, cacorbridge@ua.edu, 205/348-8539 SOURCE: Craig Wedderspoon, craig.wedderspoon@ua.edu
Rural Studio: Alabama Design | Build Projects
Exhibition: Rural Studio: Alabama Design | Build Projects Dates: August 15 – September 16, 2016 Where: The University of Alabama, Sarah Moody Gallery of Art, 103 Garland Hall This exhibition of photography and architectural models represent projects produced by Rural Studio, a design | build program of Auburn University. Among projects represented here are three projects devoted to Perry Lakes, located near Marion, Alabama: Bathrooms, Birding Tower and Pavilion. Other projects include the Antioch Baptist Church in Perry County and the Newbern Fire Station. Rural Studio of Auburn University was established in 1993 by Samuel Mockbee (1944-2001) as a field learning extension for Auburn’s architecture program. Mockbee achieved international recognition for his successes with this program and was a recipient of the MacArthur Foundation Genius Grant.