Instructor Megan Moore had an art work juried into the Southern Graphics Conference International 2019-2021 Members Traveling Exhibition. The piece, titled "It Grew with Frog Legs," combines three printmaking processes: collaged monotype, relief print and photo intaglio print. The biennial exhibit will travel around the United States for the next three years, starting in Arlington, Texas. The collection of works, selected by renowned artist and juror for the exhibition Jane Hammond, celebrates the diversity and vibrancy of printmaking, while engaging a broad range of contemporary themes and processes. Megan Moore teaches ARH 151 – Introduction to the Visual Arts (online) in the department of art and art history. She has had solo exhibitions at the Sarah Doyle Gallery, Brown University and the Rodning Gallery of Art, Marx Library, University of South Alabama. She has exhibited nationally; most recently her work was included in Global Matrix IV, Purdue University, Indiana, and the Sagebrush Art Center’s Invitational Print Exhibition in Wyoming. Her art has appeared in Graphic Impressions, the newsletter of Southern Graphic Conference International and in The Hand Magazine. Image credit: Megan Moore, It Grew With Frog Legs, collaged monotype, relief, and photo intaglio prints, 20 x 15 inches. Image courtesy of the artist. For more information about The University of Alabama's department of art and art history, visit this link: https://art.ua.edu/.
Art and Art History Faculty Accolades for Spring 2019
Jonathan Cumberland had a poster design accepted to the Third International Poster Biennial Oaxaca, in Mexico. Cumberland also had a poster design accepted to the 9th Eco Poster: Climate Changes Exhibition, hosted by the Art Institute of Cieszyn, and exhibited at the Karolinka Cultural Center in Radzionków, Poland. Lucy Curzon published “Visualising the Home Front: Evelyn Dunbar and Wartime Citizenship” in Oxford Art Journal, December 2018. Bill Dooley had two paintings accepted to the Marshall University School of Art & Design’s Eighth Annual National Juried Exhibition, in January, at the Charles W. and Norma C. Carroll Gallery in Huntington, West Virginia. Two paintings were juried into the Meridian Museum of Art’s Bi-State Juried Exhibition. Chris Jordan had a solo exhibition, Twilight Passages, in February, at The Photographic Gallery, San Miguel de Allende, Mexico. Bryce Speed had a solo exhibition, Psychic Reader: Narratives of the Sea, at the Walnut Gallery in Gadsden. Speed won first place for his paintings, Stars Fell On and The Garden, in the juried Valdosta National 2019. Jennifer Feltman was elected to a three-year term on the board of directors of the International Center of Medieval Art, The Cloisters. Feltman co-edited The Long Lives of Medieval Art and Architecture, and authored the introduction. The book was published in March in both ebook and hardback by Routledge. Jason Guynes had two works accepted to the juried exhibition Valdosta National 2019; two works juried into the 25th Annual El Corazon Exhibition at the Bath House Cultural Center in Dallas, Texas; and a work accepted in Arts in Harmony 2019: the North Show International Juried Exhibition in Minneapolis, Minnesota. Megan Moore had an art work juried into the Southern Graphics Conference International 2019-2021 Members Traveling Exhibition. The biennial exhibit will travel around the United States for the next three years. For more information about The University of Alabama’s department of art and art history, visit this link: https://art.ua.edu/.
UA Professor’s Work Installed at Montgomery Museum’s New Sculpture Garden
Professor Craig Wedderspoon's sculpture, Oval, is part of the Montgomery Museum of Arts new John and Joyce Caddell Sculpture Garden, which opened September 30, 2018.
Lucy Curzon Named A&S Leadership Board Faculty Fellow
Dr. Lucy Curzon, associate professor of art history, was named to a three-year term as a College of Arts and Sciences Leadership Board Faculty Fellow. The Leadership Board of the College of Arts and Sciences recognizes its most promising or most accomplished teacher/scholars, individuals early in their careers who demonstrate exceptional promise or faculty members who have brought distinction to the College and University throughout their careers. Curzon will receive a $5,000/year stipend for three years. Curzon teaches graduate and undergraduate courses on modern and contemporary art, and contemporary practice and community engagement. Her current research focuses on national identity and visual culture, particularly relating to the interwar, wartime and early postwar periods in Great Britain. She has also published on contemporary portrait painting. In 2018, Curzon received the Historians of British Artist Book Award for Exemplary Scholarship on the Period after 1800 for her book, “Mass-Observation and Visual Culture: Depicting Everyday Lives in Britain” (Routledge, 2017). For more information about UA Department of Art and Art History programs, click here: https://art.ua.edu/academics/.
UA Professor Researches Medieval Cathedral Sculpture
In medieval art, it is rare to know the name of an artist, but the names of the clergy who managed payment for construction projects are often in the records. Thanks to a UA College Academy of Research, Scholarship, and Creative Activity (CARSCA) grant, this past June, Assistant Professor Dr. Jennifer Feltman traveled to Paris and Amiens, France, to study the books read and written by the clergy of the Cathedral of Amiens for a new project that proposes a way to understand how sculptural programs were designed. “I primarily consulted twelfth- and early-thirteenth century biblical manuscripts, but also some sermons and commentary—all of these manuscripts are unillustrated, which may seem a strange source for an art historian. But I was studying them not only for their textual context, but also for the layout of text and commentary on each folio. Bibles of the twelfth century were often organized into columns with a main text and commentary in the margins. It is my supposition that the façade of Amiens preserves a pattern of thought, shaped by the layout of texts; it also brings together a variety of texts available in the cathedral library. So, while sculptures certainly aren’t the same as a manuscript of the Bible, they might be called a stone Biblia, using the original sense of the word for Bible—a collection of texts.” Dr. Feltman is currently completing a book manuscript, Moral Theology and the Cathedral: Sculptures of the Last Judgment in Thirteenth-Century France. The book illuminates the ways in which Parisian moral theology was disseminated through clerical networks across the dioceses of France and made visible in sculptural programs at the cathedrals of Chartres, Paris, Reims and Amiens. With the support of the NEH, she has developed a companion website: Portals of the Last Judgment - Chartres, Paris, Reims, Amiens. Dr. Feltman teaches courses in medieval, Early Christian, Byzantine, and ancient art history. For more information about UA Department of Art and Art History programs, go here: https://art.ua.edu/academics/.
UA Art History Professor Presents Research in England
Dr. Wendy Castenell traveled to the United Kingdom to present her paper, "Mutable Identities: The Performance of 'Whiteness' in a Colonial Louisiana Portrait" at Durham University's Portraiture Conference in July. The conference was sponsored by the Centre for Visual Arts and Culture. Castenell noted, "It's a rare opportunity to be able to present my research internationally and I'm grateful to the Department of Art and Art History, Dean Olin, Associate Dean Tricia McElroy, and Associate Dean Roger Sidje for travel funding. Castenell is Assistant Professor of Art History and teaches courses in American and African American art history.
UA Ceramics Instructor Receives National Award
UA art instructor Wade Folger MacDonald received the National Council on Education for the Ceramic Arts (NCECA) 2018 Emerging Artist Award. The award recognizes exceptional early career artists and helps promote their work internationally for the year. As part of the award, MacDonald participated in an exhibition at the David L. Lawrence Convention Center in Pittsburg, Penn., during this year's NCECA conference and addressed the conference with an artist talk. A generous monetary prize is also granted to the award recipients. In addition, an exhibition titled Parallel/Collision that MacDonald proposed and is co-organizing has been accepted for this year's NCECA conference. Here is a video of MacDonald's talk: He also wrote a post, titled "Becoming an Artist and Advice for the Future" for the NCECA Blog. MacDonald teaches courses in ceramics and art foundations in the Department of Art and Art History at The University of Alabama. For more information about The University of Alabama’s programs in studio art and art history, go here: https://art.ua.edu/academics/.
UA Professor’s Book Spotlights Andrew Jackson’s Portraits
When President Trump hung a portrait of President Andrew Jackson in a prominent spot in the Oval Office, in hopes that Americans would associate Trump with the controversial president who fought for the “common man,” it helped put Jackson back in the public discourse. Jackson – unusually for his day – carefully crafted his public image – one thing the two presidents have in common. And UA assistant professor of art history Dr. Rachel Stephens is helping to clarify that conversation. Stephens’ monograph – the first book-length study of Andrew Jackson's personal portrait artist – has recently hit the bookshelves. Selling Andrew Jackson: Ralph E. W. Earl and the Politics of Portraiture, from the University of South Carolina Press was published in June 2018. In it, Dr. Stephens examines the role of Earl, Jackson’s “Court Painter,” in Jackson’s inner circle and the influence of his portraits on Jackson’s political career and historical legacy. We asked Dr. Stephens a few questions about what she hopes her book will bring to readers. Here are her answers: What will we learn about Andrew Jackson by reading your book that we didn’t know before? RS: Andrew Jackson's reputation precedes him, but few realize that he actually hired a full-time artist. Artists were always clamoring to paint the early presidents, and dozens of artists painted Jackson, but in order to control his own visual message, he hired Earl's services full time, and Earl even lived at Jackson's plantation and at the White House. I believe that Earl and Jackson collaborated on the portraits, and that each one was intended to respond to the current events of Jackson's life. Earl and Jackson became very close friends over the course of their 21-year friendship, and Earl is buried in the Jackson family cemetery at the Hermitage. How many paintings total did Earl paint of Andrew Jackson? RS: Earl painted untold numbers of portraits of Jackson. He painted him almost daily for fifteen or more years. An unfinished portrait of Jackson was on his easel when he died. The exact number is impossible to calculate because Earl didn't sign his works and records for them do not exist, but there are dozens of them! How many times a day did Earl paint images of AJ? RS: Seemingly, Earl was employed full time in painting Jackson. Visitors to Jackson's White House regularly mention Earl at his easel in the background or in his studio. Depending on the nature of the portrait, it might take Earl anywhere from a few days, to over a year to complete a portrait. What’s the most important thing you hope to communicate to readers with this book? RS: I'm so happy to see the book in print! I hope it will educate readers about the significant impact that Ralph E. W. Earl had on Jackson's career and also the importance of his contribution to American Art. Rachel Stephens is an assistant professor of art history in the Department of Art and Art History at The University of Alabama. Her research investigates the art and visual culture of the antebellum era, particularly in the South. For more information about The University of Alabama’s programs in studio art and art history, go here: https://art.ua.edu/academics/graduate-programs/art-requirements/.
Art and Art History Faculty/Staff Accolades Spring 2018
A book by Dr. Lucy Curzon, associate professor of art history, has received the Historians of British Artist Book Award for Exemplary Scholarship on the Period after 1800. The book is “Mass-Observation and Visual Culture: Depicting Everyday Lives in Britain” (Routledge, 2017). The book critically analyzes the role that visual culture played in the early development of the innovative British anthropological research group founded in 1937. Assistant Professor of art history Dr. Jennifer M. Feltman published an article, “The Last Judgement Porch at Lincoln Cathedral Over the Longue Durée: Iconography, Interaction, and Religious Thought,” in Devotional Interaction in Medieval Britain and its Afterlives, edited by Elisa A. Foster, Julia Perratorre, and Steven Rosenski. Leiden: Brill, 2018, pp.103-126. Assistant Professor of art Matt Mitros was invited to show his art work in the exhibition, A Southern Table, Mason-Scharfenstein Museum of Art, Demorest, GA. Mitros' work, along with a work by Instructor Wade MacDonald, was accepted into the juried exhibition, Small Favors XIII, at the Clay Studio in Philadelphia, PA. Associate Professor of art Chris Jordan received the juror’s award for his image, Emptying, in the exhibition Myths, Legends and Dreams at the Vermont Photoplace Gallery in Middlebury, Vt. in March 2018. https://art.ua.edu/loupe/art-professors-work-receives-jurors-award/ Associate Professor of art Pete Schulte's artwork was included in Spring/Break Art Show: Frontiers, part of the annual Armory Art Show in New York City in early March. His graphite, gouache and ink drawing on paper titled, "A Letter Edged In Black," (2017, 15 x 15 inches) was mentioned in the preview article in ArtNews. 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.