Exhibition “Portraits of Places” Open in Williams Gallery until May 25
“Portraits of Places,” paintings, photographs and drawings by artists Jan Knipe, Jim Knipe, Linda White and Bill White, are on exhibit in Williams Gallery in Huntley Hall on the campus of Washington and Lee University. Their artwork had previously been displayed in Williams Gallery and will be up until May 25.
The exhibit is free and open to the public.
These artists share a mutual concern for ”a sense of place,” as landscapes from various regions and countries including Virginia, Arizona, California and Italy are part of their art.
Bill White’s recent landscape paintings offer views of Roanoke, Va., as seen from high vantage points above the rooftops of downtown. These paintings, with their dramatic angles coupled with sophisticated color harmonies, sweep viewers through city spaces that reflect the new and the deep-rooted urban environment of today. This work was done with support from a GAP (Grant for Arts Programs) grant from the Arts Council of the Blue Ridge.
The color photographs by Jim Knipe trace the story of a culture through the remnants of architecture. The edifice of houses, churches and fast food restaurants represent faces from a past life. These nearly minimal images depict the intense light of the Southwestern region coupled with the vast space that holds isolated structures where color becomes time. They were done while Knipe was an artist in residence at the Museum of Northern Arizona.
Jan Knipe’s drawings are selected from work done in California and Virginia. The internal workings of these drawings are a cavalcade of forms, delicate elements juxtaposed against the suburban world of repeated structures. This cacophony of internal relationships invades the space fabricating a world of both logic and chaos. Knipe is the recipient of the Virginia Commission for the Arts Individual Artist Grant for Works on Paper.
Photographs of the Italian landscape by Linda White are embedded with a reverence for history and art. Cultural symbols bathed in light are immersed within the landscape, often engulfed by vegetation, suffused with a sense of suspended time. Icons from a previous era, whether they are architecture, sculpture or preserved spaces, emphasize tradition as a valuable part of our daily life, establishing for the viewer an unabashed romance between the past and the present.
The hours of Williams Gallery are Monday through Friday, from 8 a.m. to 5 p.m.
News Contact:
Julie Cline
News Writer
jcline@wlu.edu
540-458-8954
