"Monkey Hat" by Mary Jo Vath

An exhibition featuring “un” still-life paintings will be on display from April 3-May 31 at the University of Arkansas – Fort Smith, with a reception slated for April 6.  

 

“The Unstilllife” features approximately 40 paintings by artists from Zeuxis, an association of still-life painters founded in New York City in 1994 by Phyllis Floyd. The exhibition will be on display in the gallery of Windgate Art & Design, the university’s state-of-the-art visual arts facility located at 535 N. Waldron Road.

 

The exhibition offers a new approach to still-life painting, modeled after Modernist artists who reimagined the way viewers looked at still-life artworks.

 

“Suddenly, right and left, top and bottom became interchangeable, figuration morphed into abstraction, then morphed back again, all within the same painting,” wrote Trevor Winkfield, an organizer of the exhibition. “While not demanding gymnastics, our show proposes a similar challenge: can a still-life be a face, or even a body? Can a basket of fruit suggest a hillside? Does a single stick of chalk constitute a still-life? And does a still-life always have to be set upon a table, or can it, like certain Cotans, be suspended from the ceiling? The permutations – and challenges – should be endless.”

 

A reception will take place at 5-7 p.m. April 6 in the lobby of Windgate Art & Design that is free and open to the public.

 

The exhibition is one of a several featuring nationally- and internationally-acclaimed artists that UAFS brings to Windgate Art & Design to help promote the arts and increase the quality of place of the greater Fort Smith region. Exhibits are rotated out every 60 days and are sponsored by the Chancellor’s Coalition for the Visual Arts and the Windgate Charitable Foundation.

 

For more information about the exhibit, contact Lisa Suggs, senior development officer with the UAFS Foundation, at 479-788-7031 or lisa.suggs@uafs.edu. For more information about Zeuxis, visit http://www.zeuxis.us.

 

About the University of Arkansas - Fort Smith

The University of Arkansas – Fort Smith is the premiere regional institution of Western Arkansas, connecting education with careers and serving as a driver of economic development and quality of place in the greater Fort Smith region. Through a small campus, dedicated professors, and the university’s unique bond with its community, students at UAFS are able to do more in the areas they are passionate about, both on- and off-campus, in a way that prepares them for post-graduate success. To find out how you can do more at UAFS, visit www.uafs.edu.