For newly arrived Assistant Professor of Art Richard W. James, crafting sculpture usually begins with a found object and an idea. It could be a pair of boxing gloves or a boat motor or a lap harp, but each project has its own evolution as it develops. For his intricately detailed mixed media oeuvre, James has been named the 2019 Chrysalis Award recipient.
Established in 2016 by the James Renwick Alliance, the Chrysalis Award is meant support emerging artists who demonstrate excellence and a commitment to artistic innovation. Winners receive an unrestricted $5,000 award to be used for future works of art. James was named the sole recipient of this 2019 award due to his unique vision and voice.
James will accept the Chrysalis Award and give a speech at the JRA Distinguished Artist Series event on Nov. 17 in Washington, D.C. Across the country, James’ work can be found in various private collections. Here, at the Island University, interested students can register for any one of his classes.
Exhibition Dates: September 21 – December 14, 2019 Opening Reception: September 21, 2019
Extending through all the galleries in the Beeville Art Museum, Keystones features a large-scale installation connecting three of the museum’s galleries along with smaller sculptures, drawings, glass pieces, and works made of grass and turf through the museum.
The exhibition title, Keystones, refers both to conceptual connections across the entire exhibition and to the archways in Bajuyo’s installation one can enter. As with almost all of her large-scale pieces, swirling vortexes accentuate the art, suggesting infinite space, black holes, and celestial light. Bajuyo describes how influences such as outer space, black holes, and the edges or borders of transition manifest in her studio practice, and how the thin line of an event horizon on the edge of a vortex, a point of no return, an excellent visual for examining value allotment and changes in perception.
The Beeville Art Museum is located at 401 E. Fannin, Beeville, Texas It is open to the public 9 a.m.-5 p.m., Monday through Friday and 10 a.m. – 2 p.m. Saturday. To contact the museum, please call 361-358-8615 or visit our website at www.bamtexas.org.
The Islander Gallery at TAMU-CC is pleased to welcome Kitchen Talk, an exhibition of works by Virginia-based artist Steve Prince. The exhibition will feature two-dimensional works based in drawing and printmaking. As a native of New Orleans, LA, Prince ‘s work highlights his interests in art, music, and religion, and addresses issues of social injustice through a metaphorical language of faith, hope, and creativity.
Please join us for the public artist’s lecture an opening reception Friday, October 18th, from 6:00-8:00pm, at the Islander Gallery. The Islander Gallery is located at 4024 Weber Rd.
Suzy Gonzáles, Float, 2019Eliseo Casiano, Horse Breaker, Graphite and watercolor pencil on toned paper, 2017
The Weil Gallery at TAMU-CC welcomes Collective Likeness, an exhibition of works by San Antonio artist Suzy González and Tucson-based artist Eliseo Casiano. The exhibition will feature two-dimensional works across a variety of media, addressing a broad spectrum of socio-political subject matter related to cultural identity, race, familial histories, and the hierarchies of materials. The show dates are from Friday, September 27th to Friday, November 27th.
Closing this Friday, October 4th, at TAMU-CC’s Islander Art Gallery is undergraduate show Big Mood. Sponsored by graduate student, Clarissa Gonzalez, Big Mood features artwork created by TAMU-CC’s undergraduate art students and stands as an expression of life experiences and what it means to be a contemporary artist.
Rusteberg Gallery will be hosting a solo exhibition by Alexandria Canchola, TAMU-CC Assistant Professor of Art, Area of emphasis: Graphic Design. In this solo show titled Typecast, she will debut a newly completed series of work consisting of gouache paintings, hand lettering, 3D printing, and installations connecting narrative and emotion. The show will feature a selection of works devoted to the odd joy of voyeurism. Studying the roles we cast on others so that they are of a “type of person” a “type of character”.
The artwork created by Alexandria Canchola was made as part of her continuing quest to document the everyday. The work seen in Typecast, is inspired by and draws from narrative, blurring the distinctions between our perceptions of reality and our creations within it. She believes there is a strange satisfaction one experiences in their voyeuristic tendencies; watching others and forming stories about people that one never truly knows. “A person will never have all the facts. Because the facts are still a form of fiction. The facts can still steer us wrong because they are seen through our own cloudy, foggy, scratched, colored lens.”
She has investigated narrative through the combination of word and image, studying their relationship as they simultaneously merge together and break apart. This work showcases the significance that typographical forms possess using letters as formal design elements as well as basic symbols of communication. In contrast to the illustration work, which is based in narrative; a personal form of storytelling that helps us to make sense of the everyday, of the societal patterns we see and the relationships we experience.Thecolor palettes used subvert the viewer’s idea of emotion; centering on themes such as loneliness, solitude, and voyeurismand showcasing these emotions in the bright powerful hues in which we feel them.
Alexandria Canchola is a designer and illustrator, currently based in Corpus Christi, Texas, who loves drawing and painting as much as dragging and dropping. Her career in the arts was not quite a straight-line path, but instead included detours in the fields of journalism and filmmaking. She has a bachelor’s degree in Government and Journalism from the University of Texas at Austin and an MFA in 2D Design from the University of Texas Rio Grande Valley. In 2018, she completed residencies at Otis College of Art and Design in Los Angeles, California and Zea Mays Printmaking in Florence, Massachusetts. She is now an Assistant Professor for the Graphic Design program at Texas A&M University–Corpus Christi eagerly working to assist her students in their quest for knowledge so that they may feel inspired not only through the attainment of skills and methods of design but in becoming critical thinkers.
For more information about the exhibition, you can reach Alexandria Canchola by email at alexandriacanchola@gmail.com.
Greg Reuter, TAMU-CC Emeritus Sculpture Professor, is exhibiting a solo exhibition titled Fundamental Facets at the Rockport Center for the Arts in Rockport, Texas.
In Fundamental Facets, Reuter returns to his roots in ceramics and coastal subject matter. His solo exhibition presents fundamental facets of Reuter’s artistic career, in terms of medium and subject matter, and introduces new work from the convergence of these foundations. During four decades as a professor at Texas A&M University – Corpus Christi (TAMUCC), his artistic mediums broadened from ceramics to include sculptural design, metal casting, and 3D printing. The subject matter of his work also cycled from nature’s forces to religious imagery, found objects, and abstraction.
Assistant Professor of Art Meg Aubry’s 2019 Summer Semester Life Drawing class will be featured at K Space Contemporary in downtown Corpus Christi on Friday August 2, 2019 from 6:00pm – 9:00pm as part of First Friday’s Art Walk.
The Exhibition: A STUDY OF LIFE, is a curated selection of figure drawings from the TAMUCC summer students.
Please stop by the gallery during the August Art Walk to celebrate and support these students.
During the 2019 Spring semester, Assistant Professor of Art Leticia Bajuyo and her Advanced Sculpture students collaborated with Dr. Catherine Rudowsky, Dean of Libraries, and the staff of the TAMU-CC Bell Library yielding unique responses to sites throughout the first and second floors of the library.
“It became more than just me working on my art. I had to rely on others and practice good communication – whether it was with my professor, other artists, or people at the installation site. You work as a team,” said Sarah Spaulding, recent Islander graduate and sculpture student.
Following a sequence of smaller assignments, the students refined their work into proposal packets and presentations for the selection committee. The students had to respond to a variety of questions and continue to update the committee as installation time neared.
“I was given the opportunity to provide feedback and suggestions that helped shape the students’ sculptural designs and installation process,” said Anjanette Jones, Bell Library staff and a member of the committee. “The collaborative process of public art installation was fascinating to be a part of. At Bell Library, we always welcome collaboration with other departments and organizations. We’re honored to be able to showcase and support the artistic talent of our Island community.”
When Art Professor Greg Reuter arrived from California to teach ceramics and sculpture at Corpus Christi State University in 1978, the University stationery still had the name Texas A&I University-Corpus Christi. In the ensuing 40 years, Reuter has taught thousands of students, lectured in Mexico, Germany, and Japan as well as in the United States, and shown his artwork across the globe. Reuter’s work also appeared in the 1988 film, “D.O.A.,” which starred Dennis Quaid and Meg Ryan. Reuter retired in December 2018.
