LEXINGTON, Ky.⎯Transylvania University’s Morlan Gallery will open its 2018-19 season with “Lake Effect,” an exhibition that has strong ties to the Windy City.
Running Sept. 10 through Oct. 18, the free show is part of Transylvania’s New Frontiers feature event series, which asks the public to go beyond the familiar and explore ideas, art and music.
“Lake Effect” is facilitated by 1992 Transylvania graduate Trevor Martin, executive director of exhibitions at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago. It features four artists connected to that city: Claire Ashley, Susanna Coffey, Jaclyn Mednicov and Maryam Taghavi. Through painting, sculpture, installation and video, their pieces will celebrate color, texture and repetition.
“It’s an honor to feature works by these talented artists associated with Chicago, a city that has made broad contributions to the world of art—not only regionally but internationally,” Morlan Gallery Director Andrea Fisher said. “We’re especially excited to have a Transylvania graduate curate this season-opening exhibition.”
Martin will discuss the works in “Lake Effect” on Thursday, Sept. 20, at 6 p.m. Laura Bryan, vice president for academic affairs and dean of the university, will host a reception following the talk.
Other special events and hours
• Lexington Gallery Hop Reception | Friday, Sept. 21, 5-8 p.m.
• Art Talk with Claire Ashley and Jaclyn Mednicov | Thursday, Oct. 18, 6 p.m. followed by a closing reception
• Evening Hours | Wednesday, Sept. 26, 6:30-7:30 p.m. and Tuesday, Oct. 9, 6:30-7:30 p.m.
• Morlan Gallery will be closed Oct. 15 and 16 for fall break.
All events are free and open to the public and in the gallery on the main floor of the Mitchell Fine Arts Center. Regular hours are noon to 5 p.m. weekdays. For more information, contact Fisher at 859-233-8142 or go online to get more details about this season’s exhibitions and programming.
About the Facilitator
Based in Chicago, Trevor Martin is a multimedia artist, educator and arts administrator. He creates works on paper, sculpture, video and does live performances. Martin has collaborated with Kym Olsen as part of the ensemble, “Morganville,” producing durational events, curated projects and evening-length performances. He has exhibited and performed in various venues throughout Chicago and the region. As an educator, he has taught numerous workshops at Chicago’s Museum of Contemporary Art, Links Hall and Columbia College, as well as studio and courses at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago (SAIC). Martin’s work also has been featured in performances, screenings and exhibitions at various museums and galleries including Film Society of Lincoln Center, New York; St. Petersburg International Dance Film Festival; National Museum of Modern and Contemporary Arts, Seoul, South Korea; and Sun Yat-Sen University, China. He received his MFA from SAIC.
About the Artists
Claire Ashley, an adjunct associate professor at SAIC, earned her BA from Gray’s School of Art in Aberdeen, Scotland, and an MFA (painting and drawing) from SAIC. Ashley’s recent work explores inflatable objects as painting, sculpture, installation and performance costume. “I mine the language of painterly abstraction, monumental sculpture, slapstick humor, and pop art to transform mundane industrial materials into inflatable painted sculptures and performative props,” according to her artist’s statement.
Susanna Coffey is the F.H. Sellers Professor in Painting at SAIC. Her portraits are investigations of the iconic human head. The work is driven by questions about what a portrait image can mean. Meticulously observed, most works show her in many guises and locations: under dramatic lighting, highly costumed, inside a studio, within landscapes, foliage and places of fiery devastation, and amidst phantasmagoric patterns. Some portraits seem almost entirely abstract with only the barest suggestion of a human face.
Jaclyn Mednicov is a Chicago-based artist whose work combines painting, photography, collage and installation. She has studied at Parsons School of Design in New York, the University of New South Wales in Sydney, Australia, and has a BFA from the University of Kansas and an MFA from SAIC. Mednicov teaches at SAIC and Carthage College. She has also attended residencies at Vermont Studio Center and the Ragdale Foundation.
Maryam Taghavi is a Tehran-born artist completing an MFA in performance at SAIC, where she is the recipient of a New Artist Society Scholarship. She received her BFA from Emily Carr University. Her work manifests in photography, installation, video, publication and performance, and it is characterized by its site-specific and ephemeral nature. She has performed and exhibited at venues such as Queens Museum in New York, LAXART in Los Angeles, Ex Terressa Museum in Mexico City, Xpace in Toronto and Sazmanab in Tehran.