UWG Artists: A Presence in the Peachtree Road Race

No matter who wins this year’s AJC Peachtree Road Race, the University of West Georgia will have a presence in the race. The winner of the t-shirt design contest will be announced July 4, the day of the race, and three of the school’s art students are among the five finalists.

But designs by two other UWG artists are already part of the Peachtree event. Race volunteers will wear Holly Berndt’s peach-hued design. T-shirts bearing Kyler Hembree’s road sign design will be on sale during the 2012 Peachtree Health and Fitness Expo on July 1 and 2 at the Georgia World Congress Center.       

“I’m proud of what the students have done,” said Clint Samples, associate professor of art, who uses the contest as a teaching tool in his Digital Media for Artists class. “This is a huge accomplishment. We are holding our own against professionals in the Atlanta area.”

His students have been contenders in the design contest for four consecutive years. Two, in 2011 and 2010, have won it. Last year, designs by two of Samples’ students were also selected for other events related to the road race – the expo and the Atlanta Track Club’s In-Training for Peachtree program. In 2009 a design submitted by Samples was used for the expo t-shirt.

For this year’s contest Berndt, 23, took Samples advice to paint first. She painted the peach and the swoop of color below it by hand, scanning it into her computer later. Berndt used Photoshop for the skyline and overlaid the letters with the colors from her painting.

“I wasn’t expecting to win anything,” said Berndt, an art education major who graduated this spring. She will begin teaching at Staley Middle School in Sumter County this fall.

“They want you to be different and I tried to make mine different. I wanted it to be pretty – something that someone would want to wear,” Berndt said.

Hembree created her design when she took Sample’s class last year. The art education major, who graduated in 2011, is teaching at South Paulding Middle School. She recently opened Local Color, an art studio offering classes for children and adults, on Main Street in Villa Rica. 

The call from the Atlanta Track Club “was totally out of the blue,” said Hembree, 28.

Hembree started her design with a montage of road signs. “I wanted to do stuff that you would see on the road.”

But she decided the look was too cluttered and simplified the design, creating one red, white and blue sign instead. She used a Sharpie marker to write “Peachtree” and added a stem and leaf to the top of the sign. “To give it that Peachtree look,” she said.

UWG Finalist Talk About Their Designs

The UWG art students who are finalists 2012 AJC Peachtree Road Race T-shirt Design Contest talk about their designs:

• Caitlyn Weathers, 22, a senior
• Clarissa Robinson, 24, a junior
• Mallory Royal, 22, who graduated last year

They are three of the five finalists in the contest. Voting is open until April 30. You can vote once per day.

The winner will be announced on July 4, the day of the Atlanta Track Club’s high-profile 10K. The winning design will be printed on 60,000 T-shirts and the winner will receive $1,000. The other four artists will get $100.

Something to Think About: Images of Women in Modern Media

Jarrett Ellington calls his creation “Weapons of Self Destruction.” It is a ceramic torso in black and white striped lingerie. The ribs are showing, as are tattoos of a skull in a WWII-style helmet, mushroom clouds and falling bombs.

Skin melts away from the shoulder joints, revealing gears and other machine parts. There are other images too, of destruction and death. They are  “a melting pot of all these different stereotypes that people want women to be,” said Ellington, a senior art student at the University of West Georgia.

The pair represent “how people view women today,” said Ellington, 22. “They want them to be these machine-made and perfect figures. Like robots being pumped out of a factory.”
The pair represent “how people view women today,” said Ellington, 22. “They want them to be these machine-made and perfect figures. Like robots being pumped out of a factory.”

The piece, and its companion “Death by Sexy”  – this ceramic is clad in tight jeans – won UWG’s Annual Juried Student Exhibition recently. 

There is no escaping the damaging images of women in today’s media, he said.

“I see all these commercials and infomercials on TV, such as the Real Housewives and the Kardashians, that a lot of people idolize and want to look like,” he said. “It's kind of silly and sickening when you think about it. It's like there's a fixed formula that's been created that women have to fit in order to be considered perfect.”

For inspiration in creating the ceramics Ellington looked to World War II images and the work of contemporary artists Jason Walker and Sergei Isupov.

This was Ellington’s first exhibit. His concentration is graphic design. But Ellington wants to continue working with ceramics.

“I feel relaxed when I'm painting this imagery on my figures with my tiny paintbrushes, while listening to music,” said the Augusta native. “It makes me feel like I've accomplished something whenever I create something original with my hands that no one has ever made before.”

To see more of Ellington’s work, visit his Facebook page. 

M3: Movie, Music, Module Art

M3: Movie, Music, Module Art is a festival of silent movies involving faculty, students and artists in residence on campus. The festival will take place over the next four weeks at First Baptist Church (102 Dixie Street) near Adamson Square.

The festival will commence tonight with an exhibition of the 1922 classic, Nosferatu: A Symphony of Horror. UWG artist in residence, Stephano Vagnini will be performing on the organ during the showing, giving an authentic ambiance to the piece. Tonight’s presentation will include a brief lecture by UWG’s Dr. John Blair as well.

The festival will continue in the weeks to follow, showing:
Charlie Chaplin’s 1922 classic, The Circus
C.T. Dryer’s adaptation of The Passion of Joan of Arc (1928)
The Resurrected Wood: Lenten Meditation (with UWG photography students presenting their work)

We look forward to seeing you tonight at 7:00 at Carrollton’s First Baptist Church for this exciting night of entertainment from the dawn of Hollywood classics.

Call for Submissions from UWG's Department of Art

The University of West Georgia is looking for artists to donate small, original works that will emulate the efforts of the Roosevelt-era WPA and help people who are currently in need.

The “Brother, Can You Spare a Dime?” project will sell the donated works on paper from a coin-operated vending machine for $5 each. All of the proceeds will go to the Carroll County Soup Kitchen.

The project is in conjunction with the “Carrollton Collects: Prints from the WPA” exhibit, which opens at UWG’s Bobick Gallery on Oct. 27 and runs through Nov. 18. The exhibit’s opening reception is Oct. 27, from 5 p.m. to 7 p.m.

The exhibition features original prints from UWG’s permanent collection and the collections of local residents. On display are works commissioned as part of President Franklin Delano Roosevelt’s Works Progress Administration and the Federal Art Project of the 1930s.

Roosevelt’s Federal Art Project, a part of the WPA, could be considered a Depression era stimulus package. Its goal was to provide work for artists. It was also meant to raise the spirits and confidence of citizens across the country, through theater, dance, art education, and the fine and graphic arts. This highly successful and historically significant project brought a myriad of art forms to humble locations and non-traditional settings. It cut across financial and racial boundaries, and revealed the melting pot that was the American artist while documenting a cross-section of America before the technology-saturated world of today.

In the spirit of that era, UWG is asking artists who are interested in participating in the project to donate small works on paper. They are asked to create with any media that was in existence before World War II. In other words: no digital art, digital applications or new processes. All forms of printmaking, such as drawing, collage and painting, are acceptable.

All work must be flat and no larger than 4.5” x 3”, to fit inside a cardstock folder. The deadline for submission is Oct. 18. Consideration for work received after the deadline will be based on space and quality. Work will remain on view and for sale through 2011.

The submissions will be displayed in an online exhibition on the Department of Art’s website: http://www.westga.edu/~artdept/

For submissions guidelines go to the prospectus of “Brother, Can You Spare a Dime?”

at: http://www.westga.edu/~artdept/pdf%20files/spare%20a%20dime.pdf

For more information about the Carrollton Collects exhibit go to:

http://www.westga.edu/~artdept/pages/Gallery%20Info/gallery.html

For information on the Carroll County Soup Kitchen go to: http://www.carrollcountysoupkitchen.org

The “Brother, Can You Spare a Dime?” project was made possible by a generous faculty research grant from the University of West Georgia.

Contact: Debrah Santini, associate professor of art/printmaking, 678-839-4963, dsantini@westga.edu.

Art Teachers to Connect at UWG

For young students, a solid foundation in their basic courses will set them on the path to success for years to come. For teachers the challenge is to make sure students understand the importance of the basics.

“If you start them off well, if they do well as freshmen and sophomores, they are going to do well as upper classmen,” said Clint Samples, associate professor of art and the foundations coordinator at UWG. “If they are not doing well, usually, we can work with them.

In September, Samples and his Department of Art colleagues will swap stories and share ideas with other teachers attending the Connecting the Dots gathering on campus. It is the first time UWG hosts a regional forum of the Foundations in Art: Theory & Education (FATE) organization, a collective of art and design teachers.

The instructors teach the introductory level design, drawing and history of art courses that all students need to get to the next level. “Freshmen are a lot different than juniors or seniors. Foundations set the stage for what they are going to do in the future,” Samples said. In addition to the subject matter at hand, “we are teaching them good work habits, life skills, time management. Basic things that you don’t usually see with a senior student.”

The department has about 140 pre-art and art majors in their freshman and sophomore years. Samples and his Art Department colleagues, Stephanie Smith, Casey McGuire, Rebecca Reynolds, Eilis Crean and Erin Dixon, are coordinating the forum.

The keynote speaker will be Nancy Palmeri, an associate professor from the University of Texas at Arlington. FATE members represent schools such as California State University, Long Beach, Savannah College of Art and Design and Northern Illinois University. Attendees to the forum will include art teachers from Florida State University, North Georgia College and State University, Armstrong Atlantic State University, Columbus State University, Young Harris College and the University of Toledo.

“This is good for us because we are putting our name on the map,” Samples said. “We want to be a recognized leader in foundations teaching.”

Italian Artists Bring a New View of Art, Music and Literature to UWG

Music, visual arts, Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein, some Samuel Beckett, a little Keats and Shakespeare too.

That’s what the University of West Georgia’s Music Department will present on Feb. 10 at Kathy Cashen Recital Hall at 8:15 p.m. This event is free and open to the public.

“The Gothic Dream: The Horror of Silence,” is a multi-media production that dissects music, literature, cinema and fine arts to explore the varying themes in particular pieces of literature.

The ModulArt presentation uses projections of art work together with original music that depicts the ideas behind Mary Shelley’s “Frankenstein,” Alasdair Gray’s “Poor Things,” and the works of Samuel Beckett.

Aidaduo – guest performers the singer Giorgia Ragni and pianist Stefano Vagnini – will be accompanied by music instructor Annie Stevens on percussion.

According to their MySpace page, Ragni and Vagnini are an inseparable duo in art and in life since 2003.

They met each other for the first time seven years ago, during the a rehersal of the opera La Traviata. Stefano was the conductor and Giorgia was one of the soloists.

They have been together ever since. They spend their time studying and researching for new artistic methodologies, experimental projects and performing together in the most important organ/piano and voice festivals in Italy and abroad.

They were both born, raised in Fano, Italy. Three years ago the left jobs, friends and families to live a new artistic experience abroad. They bring new artistic view called Modular Art to cultural art centers, universities and museums.

Bobbie Emmons, the music department’s program coordinator and drama coach, will narrate “The Gothic Dream: The Horror of Silence” with the words of Shelley, Gray, Beckett, John Keats and William Shakespeare.

The production will feature the works of Bruce Bobick, UWG professor and chair emeritus of art.

For more information contact Emmons at 678-839-6262 or bemmons@westga.edu.

For more information on Aidaduo go to http://www.myspace.com/aidaduo or http://www.facebook.com/pages/AIDADUO/120612897249?v=wall