Professor and Curator Announces New Exhibit
In addition to teaching in the Department of Art and Art History, Studio Art Professor Duncan Martin (C’76) and I have been co-directing the James K. Schmidt Gallery since it opened in fall 2017 as part of the renovated Voney Art Center. The gallery has two primary purposes: 1) to organize our annual juried student exhibition as well as the annual senior capstone exhibitions and 2) to bring the contemporary art world to campus by regularly featuring exhibitions by nationally and internationally recognized artists. As part of the latter, Duncan and I periodically organize and curate exhibitions of work by Principia College alumni who are professionally accomplished. The current online exhibition, In the Presence of Nature: Paintings by Carolyn Lord, is part of this effort.
A former student of James Green, James Schmidt, Judith Felch (C’67), and Glenn Felch (C’68), Carolyn graduated from Principia College in 1978 with a BA in studio art. Based in California, she has established herself as a prominent regional painter and has also received national attention through exhibitions and press.
When I began working with Carolyn in the fall of 2019 to plan the exhibition, we, of course, were anticipating a “real” exhibition in the physical space of the Schmidt Gallery. But with the emergence of the pandemic, Carolyn and I soon realized that we would need to pivot our efforts toward planning a virtual exhibition. And we are quite satisfied with the result, which focuses on her recent paintings. To supplement visitors’ appreciation of the work, the exhibition includes an introduction, an essay by art historian Jann Haynes Gilmore, and, of course, Carolyn’s artist’s statement and bio. As part of the educational mission of the Schmidt Gallery and in conjunction with her show, Carolyn will be visiting several studio art classes via Zoom this fall.
In the Presence of Nature opened September 1 and will be on the gallery website through the end of January 2021. A second online exhibition opens this fall and will feature the multimedia work of Virginia-based artist Jim Sconyers. Titled Conceptual Reveries, this show will provide a survey of Jim’s work from the past 17 years. It “goes live” November 3 and runs through February 28, 2021.