CONTEMPORARY CAROLINA ABSTRACTION II

CONTEMPORARY CAROLINA ABSTRACTION II:

Michael Brodeur

Anna Redwine

Tom Stanley

H. Brown Thornton

Enid Williams

&

Paul Yanko

February March 9 – 20, 2012

Artist’s Reception: Friday, March 9, 2012, 5:00 – 9:00 p.m.

Gallery Hours:

Weekdays, 11 a.m. – 7 p.m.; Sat., 11 a.m. – 5 p.m.; Sun., 1 – 5 p.m.

& by appointment

For more information, contact Wim Roefs at if ART:

(803) 238-2351 – wroefs@sc.rr.com

            At Gallery 80808/Vista Studios, 808 Lady Street, Columbia, S.C., if ART Gallery presents Contemporary Carolina Abstraction II: Michael Brodeur, Anna Redwine, Tom Stanley, H. Brown Thornton, Enid Williams & Paul Yanko. The exhibition opens March 9 with an artists’ reception from 5:00 – 9:00 p.m. and runs through March 20. The exhibition follows the if ART Gallery show Contemporary Carolina Abstraction I, which will close at Gallery 80808/Vista Studios on Tuesday, February 28, 2012.

            Both exhibitions run alongside but independently of the large exhibition at the South Carolina State Museum Abstract Art In South Carolina: 1949 – 2012, which opened February 24. if ART Gallery artists in both the if ART and State Museums exhibitions are Blair, Spong, Walker, Stanley, Thornton, Williams and Yanko.

            Contemporary Carolina Abstraction II marks the introduction of Greenville artist Enid Williams (b. 1958) to if ART Gallery. The Texas native earlier this year was the recipient of a prestigious Pollock – Krasner Foundation Grant. She has won grants, fellowship and awards in South Carolina, Ohio and Pennsylvania, including from Pittsburgh’s Carnegie Museum of Art. Among the public collections that hold her work are the Carolina Collection at the Medical University of South Carolina in Charleston and the Columbus Museum of Art in Ohio. Williams, who teaches art at Greenville Technical College, has exhibited at the Carnegie Museum, the Columbus Museum, the South Carolina State Museum and the Greenville (S.C.) County Museum of Art.

            Michael Brodeur (b. 1947), a recent addition to if ART Gallery, teaches at Furman University. The Greenville artist studied with Philip Guston at Boston University, where he earned an MFA in painting and drawing. He has exhibited at, among other places, 701 Center for Contemporary Art in Columbia, S.C., the Museum of Contemporary Art in Minsk, Belarus, the Greenville (S.C.) County Museum of Art and the Fort Lauderdale Museum of Art in Florida. His work is represented in the South Carolina State Art Collection, the South Carolina State Museum, the Greenville County Museum, the LaMar Dodd Art Center in LaGrange, Ga. and other public collection. Brodeur’s work was included in the book New American Paintings #58. He has been represented in the South Carolina Triennial and founded and chaired the Visual Arts Department at the South Carolina Governor’s School for the Arts and Humanities in Greenville.

            Columbia resident Anna Redwine (b. 1978), a native of New Orleans, has been a popular fixture on the Columbia art scene for almost a decade. She has had solo exhibitions with if ART Gallery at Vista Studios in 2006, 2007 and 2010. In 2007, she was included in Essence of Asia: Eastern Influences in Western Art at the Asian Fusion Gallery of New York’s Asian Cultural Center. Redwine’s work is included in the South Carolina State Art Collection. She is the current president of the Columbia Design League.  She has had residencies in the United States and Germany.  Redwine in 2000 she received a BA in English from the University of Mississippi. In 2006, she received her MFA from the University of South Carolina in Columbia.

            Rock Hill, S.C., resident and Winthrop University art department chair Tom Stanley (b. 1950) is among the Southeast’s most active and prominent contemporary artists and curators. The Texas native, who was raised in North Carolina, has exhibited at prominent institutions in the United States, Switzerland, Germany and France, including the South Carolina State Museum, the Musee de la Halle Saint Pierre in Paris, the Halsey Institute for Contemporary art in Charleston, S.C., the New Orleans (La.) Center for Creative Arts, the Southeastern Center for Contemporary Art in Winston-Salem, N.C., and La Galerie de Marche in Lausanne, Switzerland. Stanley has been represented in the South Carolina Triennial and in the book New American Painting, and his work is in the South Carolina State Art Collection. He has executed numerous public art projects throughout the Carolinas, including several for the Charlotte Area Transit System (CATS). 

            Aiken, S.C., native and resident Hollis Brown Thornton (b. 1976) holds a BFA from the University of South Carolina. He was in The Felt Moment, a 2003 show of art from the Carolinas at the Columbia (S.C.) Museum of Art. He has been represented at Art Miami and was in South Carolina Birds: A Fine Arts Exhibition, a 2004 – 2006 traveling show of South Carolina art. He has been in exhibitions, many of them solo shows, at City Art Gallery, Gallery 80808 and Gallery 701 in Columbia, the Jackson Gallery and the Aiken Center for the Arts in Aiken, the Linda Warren Gallery, Thirteenth Floor Gallery and Verdir in Chicago, Mary Pauline Gallery in Augusta, Ga., the Barbara Archer Gallery in Atlanta, Ga., and if ART Gallery.  He will be represented in the upcoming book 100 Southern Artists, due out later this year.

            Youngstown, Ohio, native Paul Yanko (b. 1968) teaches at the South Carolina Governor’s School for the Arts and Humanities in Greenville. He holds an MFA in painting from Kent State University and a BFA from the Cleveland Institute of Art. He has exhibited at the Cleveland Museum of Contemporary Art and the McDonough Museum of Art in Youngstown, Ohio, and other venues in Michigan, Ohio, Arizona, Florida, Massachusetts, New Mexico, North Carolina and California. His solo exhibitions include those at the Greenville (S.C.) County Museum of Art, the University of South Carolina Aiken, the exhibition space “superior” in Cleveland, Gallery 138 in Kent, Ohio and other venues in Ohio and Pennsylvania. Among the public collections that hold his work art those at the Medical University of South Carolina in Charleston and the Greenville (S.C.) County Museum of Art.