Monmouth University’s Department of Art & Design is pleased to announce the opening of three exhibits: Karen Bright—Throughline, Just Beachy/After Sandy and A Sense of Place in Contemporary Encaustic. All three exhibits will run through Dec. 9 and receptions will be held at the DiMattio Gallery at Rechnitz Hall and the Ice House Gallery on Friday, September 20, 6 – 9 pm. Free and open to the public.
A Sense of Place in Contemporary Encaustic will be on display in The Ice House Gallery and will complement the two simultaneous exhibits in the DiMattio Gallery. Karen Bright—Throughline a retrospective, and Just Beachy/After Sandy a public, participatory installation by Karen Bright and Amanda Stojanov will feature themed, placed-based work related to the ocean, environment, and climate change with a focus on Hurricane Sandy.
About Karen Bright—Throughline
Karen Bright—Throughline is an exhibition spanning 40 years of visual work by Karen Bright, Professor from the Department of Art and Design. Bright’s environmentally focused themes serve as the main thread over four decades of work with consistent narratives on the environment and climate change. Additional themes in Bright’s work reveal a long-term interest in prevalent social and cultural issues such as the MeToo movement, and global politics. Bright works in a variety of media including: painting, sculpture, drawing, and limited edition digital and fine art prints.
About A Sense of Place in Contemporary Encaustic
A Sense of Place in Contemporary Encaustic has been curated by Karen Bright, Professor of Art and Design at Monmouth University, and guest curated by renowned artist and teacher Lisa Pressman, and Oregon-based artist Kathleen Curtis Cosgrove. The curators reviewed the work of many nationally known artists who have consistently derived inspiration from the concept of place. Final selections from the final round of artists were juried by the curators. The ambition was to bring together a unique group of contemporary artists, whose work aesthetic not only speaks to the theme of place, but whose artistic achievement using encaustic-based materials met a very high level of experimentation and expression.
Exhibiting artists include: Christine Aaron, Susanne K. Arnold, Dan Addington, Marilyn Banner, Pamela Blum, Debra Claffey, Kathy Cantwell, Linda Cordner, Pam Farrell, Diana González Gandolfi, Jeff Hirst, Jeffrey Juhlin, Sara Mast, Jane Michalski, Cherie Mittenthal, Laura Moriarty, Leslie Neumann, Marybeth Rothman, Sue Stover, Pamela Wallace and Janise Yntema. The exhibit will feature one piece by each of the curators.
About Just Beachy/After Sandy:
Just Beachy, After Sandy is a 5-part, public, participatory installation by Karen Bright featuring a collaborative work by Assistant Professor of Communication, Amanda Stojanov. The exhibit will feature placed-based work related to the legacy of Hurricane Sandy offering visitors the chance to share their personal stories, contemplate their experience while raking or digging in a 6’ x 6’ sandbox, hear and view Stojanov’s digital media interpretation of Sandy – while sitting in a personal-sized geodesic dome – and learn while walking through a maze of hanging panels. The goal for this installation is to bring the community together, with the hope that through shared experience, people will find a new venue for personal interaction and healing. The exhibition was funded in part by Monmouth University’s Urban Coast Institute.
This event is also part of the Monmouth University Center for the Arts 2019-2020 season. For more information, visit www.monmouth.edu/mca.
About Karen Bright
With a background in drawing, printmaking, and graphic design, current fine art work is focused on painting and sculpture rendered with encaustic medium and paint, dry pigment, paper, graphite, oil, and found organic or man-made elements. Working in the abstract, a consistent focus is to create work that comments on the fragile structure of our world. Depending on the piece, concepts can originate from the natural environment or be derived out of the larger human experience. Exhibiting since 1981, Karen’s work has been widely shown and has won many exhibition awards. Recent grants include: two awards from the Urban Coast Institute at Monmouth University, a project grant from International Encaustic Artists, and multiple Creativity and Research Grants from Monmouth University. Artist-in-residency appointments include: Weir Farm National Historic Site, Petrified Forest National Park, and Hot Springs National Park.
Karen is a Professor in the Department of Art and Design at Monmouth University, teaching upper-level courses in graphic and interactive design. Previous academic appointments include: Rutgers, The State University of New Jersey, and Parsons School of Design in New York City. Professor Bright owns and operates Studio Bright in the recently opened Fort Monmouth section of Oceanport, New Jersey. Academic degrees include an MFA from Cranbrook Academy of Art in Graphic Design, and a BFA with honors from the University of the Arts in Printmaking.
About Amanda Stojanov
Through installations and use of world-building techniques, Amanda investigates how innovations in communication technologies affect perceptions of identity, agency, and visibility. Amanda’s areas of expertise are new media, multi-media installations, design, interactivity, creative coding, and networked media. Research interests are physical computing, game-theory, mixed reality, and computer graphics.
Amanda Stojanov is an Assistant Professor of Digital Media in the Department of Communication at Monmouth University. Amanda has experience working with design teams in large design studios (TBWA/MAL), independent agencies, and non-profit organizations. Previously, Amanda was an educator at Loyola Marymount University, Art Center College of Design, and UCLA. Amanda graduated with a BFA in Graphic Design from Monmouth University and was educated at Art Center College of Design. She recently completed her MFA at UCLA in the Design Media Arts Department.
Media Contact: Kelly Barratt 732-263-5114 | kbarratt@monmouth.edu
