Purdue Galleries presents "Moonlight Cocktails" and figurative sculptures
January 9, 2014
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David Driesbach, "Magician's Sabbath," color lithograph, 1984 |
WEST LAFAYETTE, Ind. - Purdue Galleries on Monday and Tuesday (Jan. 13 and 14) will open two new exhibits, one a retrospective of printmaker David Driesbach and the other a roomful of figurative sculptures by Emily Trick.
"Moonlight Cocktails are the Thing" will be presented from Jan. 13 through Feb. 22 in the Robert L. Ringel Gallery in Stewart Center.
Traffic lights, chandeliers, top hats and tubas are props in the theatre of David Driesbach's imagination. His colorful and varied imagery populates a landscape of art historical references and self-portraiture. This retrospective of his work includes original intaglios and lithographs, along with printing plates and working proofs, providing access to Driesbach's complete creative process. The exhibition was organized by the Northern Illinois University Art Museum.
Driesbach, a Northern Illinois University Presidential Research Professor Emeritus, is internationally recognized for his unique abilities to transform printmaking media into his own vehicle for expression. His style reflects an autobiographical reality, which appears as a dream-like narrative touched with symbolism and peopled with theatrical characters, musicians, family members and even the artist himself, his top hat signifying that he is acting as master of ceremonies.
Driesbach says, "I know that I am telling stories in my prints. … Sometimes I don't know what the story is until the print is done. I work in an additive manner - meaning that new characters and symbols are added as the print develops". This imaginative approach to the development of symbolic narratives often simultaneously incorporates the use of multiple printmaking techniques within one composition.
From 5:30-7 p.m. Jan.23 Purdue Galleries will host an opening reception for the "Moonlight Cocktails are the Things" exhibition in the Robert L. Ringel Gallery in Stewart Center. Peter Olson, assistant director of the Northern Illinois University Art Museum and a former student of Driesbach, will present a gallery talk on the artist and his works during the reception.
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Emily Trick, Studio View, 2012 |
Emily Trick: "Imagined, Desired, and the Factual" will be presented from Jan. 14 through Feb. 22 in the new Fountain Gallery in downtown Lafayette.
Emily Trick's sculpture is mostly figurative but the process in which they are created is loosely structured, allowing direct gestural manipulations that break the figure into fragmented surfaces held together more by an idea of the figure rather than by its direct representation. The everyday qualities of the materials turn the figure into something seemingly found or invented.
The emphasis in the grouping of works in Fountain Gallery is as much on the pieces' interaction as on their individual presence or absence. This interaction dissolves the figures' specificity in favor of a more abstracted space reminiscent of a forest or, conversely, a field of raw materials; a space filled with tension between imagined, desired, and the factual.
Trick was awarded an Ohio Arts Council Individual Excellence Award for 2013 and completed this work in part through The Jentel Residency Program and the National Artist Teacher Fellowship Program.
From 5:30- 7 pm Jan. 17, Purdue Galleries will host an opening reception for the "Imagined, Desired, and the Factual" exhibition at the Fountain Gallery in downtown Lafayette. The artist will present a gallery talk on her work during the reception.
The Robert L. Ringel Gallery is located in Stewart Center on the main campus of Purdue University. The gallery is open 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. Mondays through Saturday and until 8 p.m. Thursdays. The Fountain Gallery is located at 330 Main Street, Lafayette, in the historic Perrin Building. The gallery is open noon to 7 p.m., Tuesdays through Saturdays. All Purdue Galleries exhibitions and events are free and open to the public.
For class and group visits, contact Craig Martin at Purdue Galleries at 765-494-3061. For more information, visit http://www.purdue.edu/galleries
Contact: Craig Martin, 765-494-3061, cdmartin@purdue.edu
