Events

LEXINGTON, Ky.—Transylvania University will present Stories to Tell: The Work of Winfred Rembert from Sept. 8 through Oct. 13 in Morlan Gallery. Rembert is known for colorful paintings on leather sheets that depict life in the rural, pre-Civil Rights South. He will visit the gallery on Sept. 8 for an opening reception along with Vivian Ducat, who directed an award-winning documentary about him. “Rembert paints stories that look back to his youth in the days of segregation,” according to Adelson Galleries, which loaned the artworks to Morlan Gallery. “Despite the often grim working conditions he encountered (not to mention a near-lynching and years spent on a prison chain gang), Rembert’s works focus on the joyous aspects of black life in the 1950s South—the strong family and community bonds, the cultural vibrancy and the many colorful characters that lifted the spirits of those who had little choice but to labor in the region’s cotton and peanut fields.” The Adelson Gallery describes the Cuthbert, Ga., painter’s works as “marked by tactile surfaces, saturated colors, and lively, rhythmic patterning.” Rembert has been compared to acclaimed African-American artists such as Hale Woodruff, Jacob Lawrence, Horace Pippin and Romare Bearden. “Rembert, who is self-taught, lives and works in New Haven, Conn. His paintings are represented in a number of important public and private collections, and were the subject of a major exhibition at the Yale University Art Gallery in 2000.” Morlan’s Rembert exhibition will be

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LEXINGTON, Ky.—Transylvania University’s senior thesis exhibition, In Case You Missed It (or #ICYMI), will open Friday with a reception and art talks. The Morlan Gallery exhibition will feature works in a variety of media, from tennis balls to textiles. A catered reception will be from 6-7 p.m., followed by 15-minute talks by the artists about their work. The show, reception and talks are free and open to the public. Featured artists Carrie Billet, from Harlan, Ky., is a studio art major who works in textile, video and paint to create a narrative about the relationship between place and self. Henry Kramer, of Cincinnati, is a studio art major working in the traditional media of paint and the not-so-traditional media of tennis balls to investigate his personal life and what he describes as “important things in my way.” Hannah Logsdon, from Georgetown, Ky., is majoring in studio art and history. Her work is primarily ceramic, but she includes drawing, painting and metal work in her thesis exhibition. Logsdon, who explores the human form and artwork as a living being, said: “I like the physicality of artmaking; there is a tangible partnership the artist has with the work, both in the manipulation of material and the relationship to the subject.” Theodora Salazar, originally from Chicago, is a self-designed social practice art major. She has created a series of mixed media pieces exploring social and community responsibility and self reflection. The Morlan Gallery, which

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Lexington, Ky.— Transylvania University’s Morlan Gallery presents “The Places We Live,” an exhibition of artists working in social engagement from Feb. 21 through March 29. Six social intervention artists from across the U.S. will activate local and regional spaces while exhibiting tangible art objects from those programmed interventions. The artists include Meredith Knapp Brickell, Wes Janz and Sean Starowitz of Indianapolis; Maria Lind Blevins of Morehead, Ky.; Mark Menjivar of San Antonio, Texas; and Michael Strand of Fargo, N.D. Social practice artists embrace a variety of methods to engage with community, both directly and indirectly. Brickell is one the artists who decided to work directly with the Lexington community. Over the last six months, she has travelled frequently to meet with a group of girls from the Northside neighborhood. This group of 7-11 year-olds—called Busy Bees—has ventured into neighborhoods with cameras and notepads to document communities. The project, titled “Sidewalk Stories,” also has been facilitated by neighborhood resident Felice Salmon. It will culminate in a Busy Bee-created fanzine, which will be on display in the Morlan Gallery as part of a larger in-gallery installation documenting the project. A variety of other social interventions will be included in “The Places We Live”—including Menjivar’s “My Sadness Goes On and On…,” a listening station of collected sad songs submitted to him from contributors around the world. Also, Janz’s installation, “Crazy for Cages,” examines the U.S. prison industrial complex. Morlan Gallery, located in Transylvania’s

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