Wednesday, October 2, 2013

CONDITIONS OF HUMANS: HINTON, TROTMAN & YAGHJIAN, Oct. 18 – Nov. 9, 2013

LESLIE HINTON – BOB TROTMAN – DAVID YAGHJIAN

October 18 – November 9, 2013

Opening Reception: Friday, October 18, 6 – 9 pm.

For a PREVIEW, Click Here.

For installation shots of the exhibition Click Here

Leslie Hinton, Soul Man, 2013, 
earthenware, underglazes and glazes, 
9 x 4 x 2.5 in., $450


Bob Trotman, Mrs. T, 2006, wood tempera, wax, 
steel, 22 x 20 x 23 in., $9,000


David Yaghjian, Yellow Tree, Red Neck, 2013,  
monotype  10 x 10 in., $500

           In its new, expanded space, if ART Gallery will present the exhibition Conditions of Humans: Leslie Hinton, Bob Trotman & David Yagjian, October 18 – November 9, 2013. The opening reception is Friday, October 18, 6 – 9 p.m.  Hinton, a recent addition to the gallery, will present new figurative ceramic sculptures; Trotman will show his quintessential figurative wooden sculptures; and Yaghjian, new paintings and monotypes. All three artists’ work is strongly figurative, exploring psychological, political, social and/or existential concerns.            
            San Antonio, Tex., artist Leslie Hinton (b.1983), a native of Tennessee, made her mark in Columbia between 2006 – 2009, when she completed an MFA at the University of South Carolina art department. Her MFA thesis exhibition was Luna Tic Tac Toe, a memorable spectacle at Gallery 80808/Vista Studios in Columbia. She holds a BFA from the University of Hawaii in Honolulu.
            Hinton creates outrageous and funny, intricate ceramic sculptures and drawings featuring figures and animals, often together, in fantastical situations that have a stream-of-consciousness quality. Since 2005, she has been in more than two dozen exhibitions in North and South Carolina, Georgia, Florida, California, Hawaii, and Taiwan, where in the spring of 2008 she studied at Tainan National University for the Arts.
            Casar, N.C., artist Bob Trotman (b. 1947) is among the South’s most prominent contemporary artist. The Winston-Salem, N.C., native is no stranger to Columbia, where he has had a solo exhibition at 701 Center for Contemporary Art and where the Columbia Museum of Art recently acquired two of his sculptures. Among the public collections that have his work are the Renwick Gallery, Smithsonian Institution in Washington, D.C., the Virginia Museum of Fine Arts in Richmond, the North Carolina Museum of Art in Raleigh, the Weatherspoon Museum of Art in Greensboro, N.C., the Mint Museum of Art in Charlotte, N.C., the Museum of Art of the Rhode Island School of Design in Providence and the Museum of Art and Design in New York City.
            Trotman wooden, figurative sculptures explore the human body as a medium for thoughts and feelings through poses, dress, gestures, facial expressions, disposition, etc. “I am most interested in expressions of alienation,” Trotman says, “alienation of the self from society, from the physical environment, and even of the self from itself.”
            Columbia resident and native David Yaghjian (b. 1948) is among South Carolina’s most prominent contemporary painters. He was selected for this year’s 701 Center for Contemporary Art’s South Carolina Biennial. Yaghjian holds a BA from Massachusetts’ Amherst College and studied in New York City at the Art Students League and the School of Visual Art. Aside from several solo exhibitions, he has been in some 45 group exhibitions, including at the Greenville County (S.C.) Museum of Art, the South Carolina State Museum and the University of South Carolina’s McKissick Museum in Columbia, the Florence (S.C.) Museum of Art, the Sumter County (S.C.) Gallery of Art, Blue Spiral 1 in Asheville, N.C., the Spruill Center Gallery in Atlanta, Ga, Chaffee Gallery in Rutland, Vt., and Figureworks gallery in Brooklyn, N.Y.
            Going with the flow of his imagination, emotions, free associations and hand and brush, Yaghjian creates figures whose trials and tribulations he catches in symbolic and metaphorical, psychologically pregnant scenes that excel in ambiguity. Some of the paintings express joy, humor and elation, others are contemplative, angst-ridden, dark and disturbing, and many combine opposite emotions. 

No comments: