Saturday, Oct. 29, 2011
Featuring seven major contemporary art exhibitions by Bill Viola, Liza Lou, Stephen Antanakos, Kendall Buster, Kehinde Wiley, Alfredo Jaar, and Nick Cave
and selections from the Walter O. Evans Collection of African American Art, the Earle W. Newton Collection of British and American Art, SCAD’s permanent collection, and the inaugural exhibition in the new André Leon Talley Gallery.
As part of the reopening program at the new SCAD Museum of Art, the Savannah College of Art and Design will present a series of seven major contemporary art exhibitions, including: Bill Viola, The Crossing; Liza Lou, Let the Light In; Stephen Antanakos, Tessares; Kendall Buster, New Growth: Stratum Field; Kehinde Wiley, Selected Works; the U.S. debut of Alfredo Jaar, May 1, 2011, and a special screening of Nick Cave, Drive-By. Representing a range of established, mid-career, and emerging contemporary artists with diverse working practices, the inaugural exhibitions provide SCAD students and faculty with direct access to work by some of the most influential artists today. The SCAD Museum of Art re-opens to the public on Saturday, Oct. 29, 2011.
“The new SCAD Museum of Art advances SCAD’s legacy of exceptional contemporary art exhibitions, installations, performances and events,” said SCAD President and Co-founder, Paula Wallace. “The museum will enrich and expand our students’ educational milieu, integrating foundational principles of art and design with the evolving genius of the contemporary art world.”
The museum’s programming is led by SCAD Executive Director of Exhibitions Laurie Ann Farrell, and newly-appointed Chief Curator of Exhibitions Isolde Brielmaier. Over the past decade, SCAD has hosted a range of dynamic art experiences featuring works by Marina Abramović, Nick Cave, Alfredo Jaar, Carrie Mae Weems, Kader Attia, Karim Rashid, and Cao Fei + MAP Office, among many others. The inaugural lineup of exhibitions sets the tone for the roster of national and international, renowned and emerging artists whose work will be presented in the museum.
Inaugural Exhibitions
Bill Viola, The Crossing
Oct. 29, 2011–Feb. 12, 2012
With a career spanning more than four decades, Bill Viola has been a pioneer in the field of video art. Co‐commissioned by SCAD in 1996 with support from The Bohen Foundation, The Crossing premiered in Savannah and has since been exhibited around the world. Rich in metaphor and grounded in shared spiritual beliefs of East and West, this canonical film celebrates Viola’s signature ability to convey complex themes with scale and sound.
Liza Lou, Let the Light In
Oct. 29, 2011–Jan. 22, 2012
In her newest body of work, Lou creates sculptures and reliefs that reference common objects such as ropes, book pages and fencing that, when layered or made into multiples and then cloaked in brilliant glass beads, evoke themes of containment, labor and repetition. With simultaneous delicacy and command, these unexpected and alluring surfaces invite investigation while disrupting our perceptions of physical barriers and confined spaces. A community of artisans works together to assist Lou in her practice of transforming the purpose of these everyday objects and upending their symbolic references of exclusion and confinement. In doing so, they share stories, songs and time, thus imbuing Lou’s work with a collective spirit and illuminating the sensibility of human workmanship. Included in Lou’s exhibition will be large-scale sculptures presented inside the museum, as well as an outdoor installation in the new SCAD Museum of Art courtyard.
Stephen Antonakos, Tessares
Oct. 29, 2011–Mar. 4, 2012
Stephen Antonakos is an abstract formalist and a pioneer in new uses of neon in art since 1960. His work is related to Minimalism in its intention to be seen as “real things in real space in the here and now.” He has a particular interest in bringing the architecture and the space of the site into the viewer’s experience. Taking the white square as a classical geometric starting-point, and given the artist’s restrained execution, the four neon panels in Tessares show how very different feelings and meanings may result from subtle formal and chromatic variations.
Stephen Antonakos was born in Greece, and grew up in New York. He has exhibited in more than 100 solo shows, more than 250 group shows, and has realized more than 50 public works installed in the United States, Europe, and Japan. He lives and works in New York City.
Kendall Buster, New Growth: Stratum Field
Oct. 29, 2011–Mar. 4, 2012
Commissioned by SCAD for the debut of the SCAD Museum of Art, “New Growth: Stratum Field” is a site-specific sculptural installation designed and constructed to converse with the resonant features of the museum’s new 290-foot south-facing gallery. Recalling the artist’s most iconic structural forms, this work explores biological architecture in all its many incarnations.
Kehinde Wiley, Selected Works
Oct. 29, 2011–Jan. 29, 2012
Los Angeles native and New York-based visual artist Kehinde Wiley has firmly situated himself within art history’s portrait painting tradition. As a contemporary descendent of a long line of portraitists—including Reynolds, Gainsborough, Titian, Ingres and others—Wiley engages the visual rhetoric of the heroic, powerful and sublime in his representations of young men of color. Wiley’s solo project at the SCAD Museum of Art will include large-scale paintings as well as a selection of works on paper.
Alfredo Jaar, May 1, 2011
Oct. 29, 2011–Feb. 12, 2012
Presented for the first time in the U.S., Alfredo Jaar’s May 1, 2011 installation is a poetic, conceptual, and socio-politically meditation on the power, and absence, of images. The installation is comprised of two juxtaposed monitors: a blank screen flanked by a framed white image; and another screen showing the now iconic official White House press image of President Obama sitting among his national security team as they stare at something outside the image field. The media surrounding the publication of this photograph has led viewers to believe that the individuals were watching live footage of the capture and killing al-Qaida leader Osama bin Laden. A diagram to the right of the monitor notes the names and titles of the various political and military figures in the room. With poignant staging, Jaar employs the symbolism of the “non-image”, inviting viewers to question what is not shown.
Nick Cave, Drive-By
A special screening of Nick Cave’s Drive-By, a recent SCAD acquisition, will be presented at the Matthew Mascotte Theater Plaza on the evenings of Wednesday, Oct. 26, 2011, and Thursday, Oct. 27, 2011. The film will begin screening intermittently at dusk.
Nick Cave’s prolific oeuvre engages sculpture, fashion, video, sound and performance. Suggestive of ceremonial garments, costume, haute couture and superhero apparel, Cave’s signature Soundsuits, or performative wearable sculptures, are intricately ornamented with reclaimed fabric and found objects selected for their symbolism and auditory function. Densely layered in material and meaning, Cave’s otherworldly creations are included in performances of spoken word, intense dance choreography and DJ music extravaganzas. Drive-By features Cave and numerous dancers, suited like supernatural beings, energetically moving and interacting in a jovial ceremony. His performances are often inclusive of and responsive to the surrounding community as evidenced by his 2009 commissioned performance realized at SCAD’s deFINE ART program.
In addition to exposing students to the work of lauded visiting artists, the museum will also present rotating exhibitions that feature selections from the Walter O. Evans Collection of African American Art, the Earle W. Newton Collection of British and American Art, as well as from SCAD’spermanent collection, which include works by Salvador Dalí, Nicholas Hlobo, Richard Hunt, Willem de Kooning, Annie Leibovitz, Robert Mapplethorpe, Wangechi Mutu, Elizabeth Catlett, Pablo Picasso, Robert Rauschenberg, Andy Warhol and Carrie Mae Weems.
Housed within the new SCAD Museum of Art, the André Leon Talley Gallery will celebrate style and design in its myriad forms. For the gallery inauguration, Talley has curated an exhibition of the iconic, seminal works of the esteemed André Leon Talley Lifetime Achievement Award honorees, including Manolo Blahnik, Oscar de la Renta, Tom Ford, Marc Jacobs, Zac Posen, Miuccia Prada, Ruben and Isabel Toledo, Diane von Furstenberg, and Vera Wang, and will showcase career-defining moments from some of today’s most famous fashion luminaries.
Related programming, including talks, lectures and other events, will be scheduled in conjunction with SCAD Museum of Art’s exhibitions. A conversation between André Leon Talley and artist Kehinde Wiley will be held at the SCAD Museum of Art theater on Friday, Oct. 28, at 4 p.m. For ticketing information, please visit scadmoa.org. Details on additional related programming will be announced later this fall.
For more information about the new SCAD Museum of Art and its programming, and opening hours, please visit scadmoa.org or call + 1.912.525.5220.
SCAD: The University for Creative Careers
The Savannah College of Art and Design is a private, nonprofit, accredited institution conferring bachelor’s and master’s degrees in distinctive locations and online to prepare talented students for professional careers. SCAD offers degrees in more than 40 majors and more than 50 minors in Savannah and Atlanta, Georgia; in Hong Kong; in Lacoste, France; and online through SCAD eLearning.
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