Kristi Taylor
August 2 through September 4, 2011
Artist Reception, August 2, from 6 – 8 pm
Inspired by nature, light, and music. My style is influenced by twentieth-century color theorists and contemporary graphic design. I have become increasingly fascinated by the ability of color and light to alter our mood in a very natural way. In reaction, I paint to create positive environments with nature elements as a foundation.
Taylor grew up in Bristol, TN, and currently resides in Kingsport, TN. Taylor received a BFA from East Tennessee State University and her unique style of contemporary landscape has a freshness that continues engage the eye and imagination of viewers.
Lisa Ellis, Morristown, TN
September 7 – October 2, 2011
Artist Reception, Thursday, September 8, 6-8pm
I photograph man-altered landscapes of East Tennessee, which include the lime hills of an ASARCO Mine and the dry lakebed of Douglas Lake. These stark landscapes, both located in Jefferson County, are often overlooked or seen as eyesores. By photographing them over a number of years, I was able to appreciate the changing appearance of the area, those transient changes from human activity as well as the more permanent ones of nature.
Ellis has been teaching classes in Photography and Art Appreciation at Carson-Newman College since 1998. Her photographs have been exhibited around the southeast. She earned her MFA from East Tennessee State University and she has recently published a book of historical photographs of Dandridge, TN.
Juie Rattley III, Kernersville, NC
October 4 – October 30, 2011
Artist Reception, Thursday, October 13, 6-8pm in conjunction with the opening of From These Hills: Art from the Southern Appalachian Highlands
On May 18, 2007, my childhood friend, Curtis DeAngelo “DD” Lennon, was killed in an apparent home invasion. Through a series of self-portraits, I show various expressions of anger, resignation, and sadness. I felt the only way to address his death was to incorporate it through visual language.
Rattley was born in Lumberton, NC, and raised in a small community just outside of Whiteville, NC. He received an MFA from the University of North Carolina at Greensboro where he was awarded the Adelaide Fortune Holderness Fellowship and the Maud Gatewood Painting Scholarship. He teaches in Guilford County Schools as part of an outreach program sponsored by the Green Hill Center for NC Art.
Sebastian Matthews, Asheville, NC
November 1 – December 30, 2011
Artist Reception, November 17, 6-8pm in conjunction with the opening of Hazel Larson Archer: Black Mountain College Photographer
For me collage, the art of making collage, is all about creating “easy pieces”: work that flows out of a good groove; a spirited session at the art table, or a long walk on which you find a piece of tossed-aside packaging that sparks an idea; or after coming back from a scout at one of the area antique stores, you have a pile of old LIFE magazines under your arm…
Matthews has been making collages for over twenty years. A published author and poet, Matthews teaches creative writing at Warren Wilson College and Queens University of Charlotte, NC. While on staff at the Black Mountain College and Museum + Arts Center, he curated a show of Ray Johnson’s early collages and kept a blog record of the process.
Olivia Gibian, Abingdon, VA
January 4 – 29, 2012
Artist Reception, Thursday, January 5, 6-8pm
In making paintings, I often reference the landscape as well as an individual experience in the landscape. This is done in both an abstract and more figurative manner. I often depict ambiguous locations that hold potential for action, or locations where action has just taken place. I see these paintings as a sort of stage- set for an unknown character.
Gibian will graduate from Virginia Commonwealth University’s Painting and Drawing Department in December 2011. She is from Abingdon, Virginia, the geography of which she considers largely influential in her work.
Deborah Bryan, Johnson City, TN
January 31- February 26, 2012
Artist Reception, Thursday, February 2, 6-8pm
People have noticed that when I walk, I often look down at the ground. This represents my fascination with discarded, unwanted, lost, misplaced, faded, trampled and frayed objects. This print series entitled Detritus, takes that philosophy to a logical conclusion, one in which objects that would normally be overlooked, or even thought of as debris, are portrayed as worthy of consideration.
Bryan is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Art and Design at Tusculum College in Greenville, Tennessee. She regularly exhibits her work nationally and internationally and is featured in many permanent collections. Bryan was featured in William King Museum’s From These Hills exhibition juried by Ray Kass in 2009.
Aleta Cortes, Pipestem, WV
February 28 – April 1, 2012
Artist Reception, Thursday, March 8, 6-8pm in conjunction with the opening of Color Me Bad: Animation, Pop, and Satire
“Reflecting” is a photographic series of manmade objects, primarily older model cars. The photographs were taken at car shows around southern Virginia and West Virginia. The photographs have not been manipulated; they are what is seen upon looking at the reflections from the polished surfaces of old cars. At times people walking past appear as rivers of color while patterns and objects distort from simple movement and splashes of light.
Cortes lives in southern West Virginia. Although her background is in painting, for the past thirteen years, she has worked solely with photography. Cortes received a BFA from Tyler School of Art, Philadelphia, PA, and has shown her work throughout the region.
Janus: Looking Back, Looking Forward
Jan Hurt, Abingdon, VA
April 3 – 29, 2012
Artist Reception, Thursday, April 5, 2012
I am a storyteller by nature, and a surrealist one at that. I love to see bizarre juxtapositions, rich and varied surfaces, and unsettling situations. My work is deeply influenced by my life experiences, so in a sense, it is also autobiographical.
Both in west Texas and southwest Virginia, Hurt has been an active arts organizer and advocate. She loves puns, as does the family she married into, and once organized a printmakers exhibit entitled, One Day My Prints Will Come. Besides being an artist, she is a foodie, wino, and crazy cat lady with seventeen cats and counting.
Jason Sabbides, Johnson City, TN
May 1 – June 3, 2012
Artist Reception, Thursday, May 3, 6-8pm
As an artist with an unlimited imagination controlled only by the infinite universe that surrounds them, he or she finds only limitless possibilities.
Sabbides joined the United States Army Infantry immediately following his high school graduation. He will receive his MFA from East Tennessee State University in the Spring of 2012.
