2018 Exhibitions
Rachel Hellmann: Boats on the Ceiling
Rachel Hellmann Blaze, 2018, acrylic on poplar wood, 26 x 21 x 7 in. Courtesy Elizabeth Houston Gallery, New York, NY
November 2 – December 30, 2018
Opening Reception: Friday, November 2, 5 – 8 pm
Hulman Gallery
Rachel Hellmann received a BFA from the University of Dayton and an MFA in Painting from Boston University. Her work includes sculpture, painting, and installation. Hellmann was Assistant Professor of Painting and Drawing at Northern Essex Community College from 2008 until May of 2013 when she relocated to Terre Haute, IN to work full-time as an artist. Hellmann describes her work by saying, “I come from a family of carpenters. My early education as an artist taught me the care for craft, love of tools and pride in working with my hands. This history led to my interest in painting as an object—something that occupies a space in a more physical way and asks to be experienced from multiple locations within that space. My paintings explore how perception is affected by the interplay of geometry, light and color. I paint on shaped forms to instill a sense of play in my work and to suggest the experience of an interior architectural space. The geometric language of bars, grids and linear repetitions echoes the methodical process I use to create the paintings. These simplified elements, combined with subtle gradations of color, create a play with perception and a vibration between the logical and the poetic.”
Andy Warhol: The Cowboys and Indians Series
November 2 – December 30, 2018
Opening Reception: Friday, November 2, 5 – 8 pm
Schell Gallery
In this 1986 portfolio, Warhol depicts an ahistorical representation that mirrors a popular interpretation of the American West. Warhol interspersed recognizable portraits of well-known American heroes – Annie Oakley, Teddy Roosevelt, and General George Custer – with less familiar Native American images and motifs in his ironic commentary on America’s collective mythology of the historic West. Rather than portraying Native Americans within their historical landscape or Cowboys in their veritable forms, Warhol chose to portray a popular, romanticized version of the west. Warhol’s rendering of the American West was already an established presentation commonly portrayed in novels, films, and various television series popular during this era. This exhibition is on loan to the Swope from the Rockwell Museum, Corning, NY.
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