Category: Campus of the Arts

UMKC Gallery of Art presents Real Black: a spectrum of the Black present

By , October 5, 2020 12:41 pm
From right to left, works by:  Danielle Randle, Makayla Booker, William Toney, Kat Looney

Real Black: a spectrum of the Black present illustrates both the experiences of living Black artists and visions of the future.  This show delineates current history and a new era of civil unrest. As a display of the living, Real Black presents a glimpse of the beauty of daily life while depicting an auspicious equitable future. 

The eleven Black Kansas City artists selected use a variety of mediums to explore a spectrum of the present in a conceptual, realistic and futuristic manner. These works include imagery of the Queer domiciliary, sculptings of the Black body, photographs of local protests, contemporary portraiture, fantastical layered collage, and abstracted explorations of early 21st century Black culture. 

Featuring works by: Phil Shafer, Jada Patterson, William Toney, Ari Bonner, Evan Jackson, Kat Looney, Frank Norfleet, Danielle Randle, Makayla Booker, Aaron Cecil, and JT Daniels

Real Black is open until 11 December 2020 in the UMKC Gallery of Art, Fine Arts Building, room 203. Hours: M-R 10am-4pm. 816.235.1502. Info.umkc.edu/gallery 

Student Art Exhibition opens March 19

By , March 5, 2020 3:05 pm
Images courtesy of the artist

Prescribed Assimilation a HARD pill to swallow

MA Exhibition by Luke Blevins at the UMKC Gallery of Art

March 19th– April 18th, 2020

Opening Reception: Thursday, March 19, 5-7 pm

Prescribed Assimilation explores the tangential relationships between boyhood, social expectations, queer culture, heteronormative assimilationism, and nostalgia. Blevins uses nostalgia as a sense of self-identity to reference and recontextualize the past through his personal lens. Nostalgia lends itself to fantasy as our memories are unreliable; we create gilded moments to revisit as escapism.

Looking back on his childhood, Blevins see the gaps between nostalgic memories and the events that shaped him. It is in these moments that fantasy, and reality intersect. Blevins views these intersections as representing what we perceive and strive for as children and the shifting relationships we have with social structures as adults.

For Blevins, the life he has led is a queer experience that is questioned by himself and society at large. His work explores the question of how he fits into the queer community and the heteronormative state. Blevins states, “as my work grows, my ability to relate to the prescribed notion of the homosexual is stretched thinner and thinner.”

Through digital manipulation and processes, Blevins creates images that propose narratives without conclusions that are snap shots of the in-between. This is achieved via layers of information combined in photoshop; color, shadow, and object work to obscure reality and paint his experience of the world in all its falsity.

Photos become paintings which become photos again. Through shifting and reiterating concepts across mediums, Blevins states, “I make art to better understand how society has shaped me. My work is a question of acceptance, alternatives to assimilation, and how I relate to the world.”             

Student Art Exhibition by Colin Mosely

By , October 18, 2019 2:37 pm

A Longing for Interspecies Companionship

M.A. Exhibition by Colin Mosely

November 7-December 13, 2019

Opening Reception: Thursday, November 7, from 5-7 pm

A Longing for Interspecies Companionship is an experimental, multi-disciplinary exploration of interstitial spaces and the invisible links contained within, entangling all animals, plants, fungi, and minerals. These spaces and connections are often disregarded, due to our humanist ideals of exceptionalism and individualism. Through the use of computer programming, animation, sculptural structures, and audio environments, Mosely exposes these overlooked and ignored correlations between biological and mineral entities.

Mosely sees his role as a knowledge seeker and translator, and throughout his practice allows biological studies to inform his artwork. His practice then serves as a way of translating these otherwise imperceptible relationships across biological and mineral categories, emphasizing the interdependence of all living creatures. Mosely’s animations represent plants acting in relation to their insect, mineral, and fungal companions, helping us envision action-based responses and enabling us to learn how to get along with other living beings. It is the artist’s hope that his work compels viewers to reconnect to their environment and sense the lively territory we are all engaged with.

Re:Print Exhibition at UMKC Gallery of Art

By , August 15, 2019 11:53 am
From right to left: John Wilson, Friday Night Fights; Lynn Manos, Fifty One Italian Dinghies; Laura Kuchynka, August iv; Lois Thompson, Where The Light Comes Through #1

UMKC Gallery of Art presents Re:Print, a new exhibition featuring an amazing array of prints by Hand Print Press. In 2019, Hand Print Press marks their quarter century partnership with The University of Missouri-Kansas City and their professional explorations in printmaking. To commemorate this anniversary, Hand Print Press decided to revisit and reflect on their artistic output and to use their collective past to start their future.

For the exhibit “RE:Prints”, members both past and present were invited to search through HPP’s archived portfolios to find images to inspire new prints. Whether it was to pay homage to, riff on, or have a dialogue with the archived prints, members were given free rein to use any printmaking technique(s) to interpret their inspirational print. The result is a remarkable exhibit which shows the wide range of subject matter, unique processes and brilliant techniques that are under the umbrella of printmaking.

The Exhibition runs from September 5th through October 18th, 2019. Opening Reception on September 5th from 5-7pm.

The UMKC Gallery of Art is located in the Fine Arts Building, room 203 (5015 Holmes Street).

For more information: https://info.umkc.edu/gallery/

About HPP
Hand Print Press is unique in the region for its mission of mentoring young printmakers. Over the past 25 years, HPP has funded grants for UMKC printmaking students and the purchase of equipment and supplies for the printmaking studio. Three national juried print exhibitions in the university’s gallery have been sponsored by HPP, providing UMKC students and the general public with exposure to a wide range of printmakers.

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