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The University Art Gallery at Sewanee: The University of the South is proud to present “Cutting Fine, Cutting Deep” (February 29 – April 13, 2008), which will introduce viewers to parallel, complementary worlds of environmentally focused cut-paper art. The exhibition will open with a reception on Friday, February 29, at 4:30 pm. Several artists from the exhibition will be in attendance and will speak briefly about their work.
Organized and curated by Sewanee art professor Julie Püttgen, this exhibition showcases five artists from the Swiss Scherenschnitt (“scissor cutting”) tradition together with six contemporary artists working in North America. Drawing from traditional papercutting techniques, these artists create silhouettes, dioramas, stencils, paper lacework, pop-up drawings, and complex symmetrical designs. The resulting narratives present striking contrasts and similarities – from Ernst Oppliger’s profound environmental love affair with Swiss pastoral life, to Humberto Duque’s absurdist figures in dismembered landscapes; from Lane Twitchell’s dense Apocalyptic cities, to Ueli Hofer’s mythical Edens.
Curator Julie Püttgen, who was born in Switzerland and grew up in the US, bridges the gap between the two groups of artists. In her “Animal Voids” series, silhouettes inspired by cutesy greeting card animals cavort in natural landscapes around Sewanee, suggesting both the absence of real animals and the presence of culture’s various fine-tuned distractions.
All of the works in “Cutting Fine, Cutting Deep” are linked together by explorations of human interrelationships with the natural and man-made world, as well as by the radically simple starting point of paper and blade. The act of cutting paper requires clarity of mind and physical patience, as well as a certain confidence in reductive and often hidden processes. As a result, each piece in the exhibition bears a palpable presence born both of its maker’s practiced hand, and of the conviction required to create it. Bringing together this small group of Swiss and North American artists for the first time, “Cutting Fine, Cutting Deep” presents a unique opportunity to consider different papercutting traditions in the context of environmental and community awareness.
An exhibition catalogue published by The University of the South will be available through the gallery. Plans for “Cutting Fine, Cutting Deep” to travel onwards to other educational and non-profit venues in the US and Switzerland in 2008-2009 are currently underway. This exhibition is supported in part by grants and donations from The Swiss Arts Council Pro Helvetia, Kuehne & Nagel, and the Tennessee Arts Commission.
The University Art Gallery is located on Georgia Avenue on the campus of the University of the South, in Sewanee, Tennessee. Hours are 10 – 5 Tuesday through Friday and 12 – 4 on Saturday and Sunday.
Please call 931-598-1223 for more information, or visit our web site at
www.sewanee.edu/gallery.
Posted by vostokone
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