- University News Archive - ��Vlog��ý Little Rock

��Vlog��ý Little Rock Opens Three New Exhibits at the Windgate Center

John Hill — Thu, 23 Jun 2022 13:00:08 +0000

��Vlog��ý Little Rock has launched three new summer art exhibits at the Windgate Center of Art and Design. The exhibits will feature artwork by the faculty members teaching the artWAYS summer workshops and intensive art camp, artwork focusing on internet era aesthetics, politics, and humor, and artwork curated from ��Vlog��ý Little Rock’s permanent art collection. The exhibits, which are free and open to the public, will be on display through July 22 in the ��Vlog��ý Little Rock Art Gallery in the Windgate Center of Art and Design. The gallery is open from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. Monday through Friday. Hot Weather, Cool Faculty The exhibit “Hot Weather, Cool Faculty” will be on display in the Brad Cushman Gallery. It features pieces by faculty teaching the artWAYS summer workshop and art camp. artWAYS is a two-week long intensive workshop for art educators and a one-week long intensive art camp for rising junior and senior high school students. Housing, meals (except dinner for art educators), and art materials are covered by a generous grant from the Windgate Foundation, making this experience free to participants. The workshop gives attendees the opportunity to see how their instructors use materials, art processes, and imagery as well as promote an enriching experience for all attendees and instructors. artWAYS instructors include Robert Bean (drawing), Kevin Cates (graphic design), Jeremy Couch (painting), Joli Livaudais (photography), Lydia Martin (jewelry), Peter Scheidt (furniture design), John Shea (ceramics), and Michael Warrick (sculpture). Jeremy Couch: Terminally Online The exhibit “Jeremy Couch: Terminally Online” will be�� in the Focus Gallery in the Windgate Center. The phrase “terminally online” is used, usually as an insult, to describe people who spend most of their time online. The body of work reflects the past three years of people consuming most of their information, news, and media online. The work channels the chaotic nature of online media feeds through juxtaposing memes and cynical, sarcastic, and political pieces. How the pieces work together, in this case, are said to be more important than what they represent individually. The Summer Art Exhibition�� The exhibit, “The Summer Art Exhibition,” will be on display in the Maners/Pappas Gallery. Each piece is presented as inspiration for the artWAYS workshop and artWAYS art camp attendees. The exhibition includes landscape photography, portraiture and figural paintings, drawings and prints, abstract paintings and drawings, letterpress prints, book binding, printmaking, ceramics, and jewelry pieces. Artists are Ediciones Vigia, Samuel Joseph Brown Jr., Henry Cravens, Angela Cummings, William E. Davis, Judith Duff, Robert Ebendorf, Susan Feagin, Emily Fan, Endia Gomez, LaToya Hobbs, Julia Leonard, Logan Hunter, Maurice Kellogg, Susan Lefler, James McCartney, Delita Martin, Joe Phillips, Kimberly Snow, Carmen Thennis, Renee Williams, and Arnold Zimmerman.

National Museum of Women in the Arts selected Livaudais for ‘Women to Watch’ exhibit

John Hill — Wed, 07 Oct 2020 21:51:22 +0000

Joli Livaudais, assistant professor of photography at the University of Arkansas at Little Rock, is someone to keep an eye on in the art world. The National Museum of Women in the Arts (NMWA) has selected Livaudais as a featured artist in the “” exhibition series premiering Oct. 8 in Washington, D.C.�� Showcasing contemporary artists, the sixth installment of NMWA’s “Women to Watch” exhibition series features up-and-coming or underrepresented artists. This year’s theme, “Paper Routes,” presents the versatility of paper, not merely as a support for drawings, prints, and photographs, but as a rewarding medium itself. NMWA is the only major museum in the world dedicated solely to championing women through the arts. Livaudais will exhibit her installation, “All That I Love,” at NMWA from Oct. 8 to Jan. 18, 2021. The installation consists of 1,500 origami paper beetles of varying sizes made of aluminum, pigment ink, resin, and mulberry paper that will be installed floor to ceiling by the artist. “I am a professor of photography, so each of those beetles is folded from a photograph,” Livaudais said. “The idea is that each image captures a special moment of beauty, something that you care about deeply. That’s why the installation is called ‘All That I Love.’ Some of the images are recruited from other artists. When people send me images, it’s of things they love, like their kids.” For Livaudais, creating the art installation has been a meditative process that allows her to appreciate the important things in life. She was inspired to create beetles from Egyptian mythology, where the scarab beetle is a symbol of the transformation of death. “This art piece is about transformation and appreciating the beauty in life before it ends,” Livaudais said. “Each photograph represents a precious moment of something that you love and find beautiful, but you can’t hang on to it forever. You fold it up into a beetle and then let it go, because that’s the way life works.” The international exhibition features artists by participating committees in Argentina, Arizona, Arkansas, northern and southern California, Canada, Chile, France, Georgia, Germany, Italy, Massachusetts, New Mexico, New York, Ohio, Peru, Portugal, Spain, Texas, and the United Kingdom.

Sims pop-up art show to feature Arkansas landscape scenes

Ajani Oyindamola — Thu, 31 Oct 2019 21:24:57 +0000

A University of Arkansas at Little Rock employee will showcase his love of photographing beautiful landscapes from Arkansas during his pop-up art show that begins Nov. 1. Brad Sims, who has worked as the media and online instruction specialist for the College of Education and Health Professions for a decade, is also a landscape photographer specializing in Arkansas scenes. “Most of my photos have been taken in Arkansas, and I am focusing on showing off places in Arkansas that that typically don’t get shown off,” Sims said. “From this show, I want people to see that Arkansas has a great deal of really unique views that don’t get enough attention. Those can be everything from hidden waterfalls in the Ozarks to the way the fog rests on the Arkansas River to really tiny, intimate views of the ground in your backyard.” Pop-up shows, which are often held in smaller, non-traditional spaces, give young and nontraditional artists the opportunity to get more exposure. Sims’ show will debut from 5-8 p.m. Friday, Nov. 1, at South Main Creative, 1600 Main St., Little Rock. His show contains images of the fog rising over the Arkansas River, cityscapes of Little Rock, and images that he’s dubbed “Tiny Landscapes,” also the name of his show. “I think the idea of people not looking closely at things that pass them by is interesting,” Sims said. “Tiny landscapes occur when I get really close and low to the ground. They are mostly pictures of moss or small rivulets of water. Whenever I take closeup photos, they usually look like larger landscape. I take tiny landscapes whenever I see interesting, weird scenes in nature.”

A tiny landscape image taken by Brad Sims at Petit Jean State Park.

Sims graduated from ��Vlog��ý Little Rock with a bachelor’s degree in liberal arts in 2000 and a master’s degree in professional and technical writing in 2013. While he’s always seen himself as a “photo enthusiast,” it’s only been in recent years that Sims has focused on his habit of taking tiny landscaping photos.�� “I’ve gotten really serious about photography in the past three years,” Sims said. “I’ve been making more choices and being more mindful of the pictures I take. In landscape photos, you usually see iconic views of these epic, iconic locations that are well known, but I’ve really gotten into the idea of taking smaller, one-of-a-kind photos that are more intimate spaces taken all around Arkansas.” “Tiny Landscapes” will be open through Nov. 30. South Main Creative is open 10 a.m. to 5:30 p.m. Tuesday to Saturday and 10 a.m. to 3 p.m. Sunday.

��Vlog��ý Little Rock to open three new art exhibits in October

Ajani Oyindamola — Wed, 09 Oct 2019 13:36:02 +0000

The University of Arkansas at Little Rock will open three new exhibits in October in the Windgate Center of Art and Design featuring the charcoal drawings by Gonzalo Fuenmayor, photography by Simen Johan, and an installation annex by Anaïs �ٲ��é. A reception for the three artists will be held from 5 to 7 p.m. Thursday, Oct. 10, in the Windgate Center. Gallery hours are 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. Monday through Friday. For more information, contact Art Gallery Director Brad Cushman at becushman@ualr.edu or 501-916-5103.�� Gonzalo Fuenmayor�� Gonzalo Fuenmayor, a Columbian artist residing in Miami, will hold an exhibit from Oct. 5 to Nov. 15 in the Small Gallery in the ��Vlog��ý Little Rock Windgate Center of Art and Design.�� ܱ�Գ��ǰ�’s monumental charcoal drawings of palm trees, waterslides, and vision testing micromachines examine notions of the exotic and the collision of culture in the tropical landscapes of Florida. The works are on loan from the Dot Fifty Gallery in Miami. Fuenmayor was born in 1977 in Barranquilla, Colombia. He received a Bachelor of Fine Art degree from the School of Visual Arts in New York City in 2000 with a minor in art education. He earned a Master of Fine Arts degree from the School of the Museum of Fine Arts in Boston in 2004. While earning his master’s degree, he earned the prestigious Traveling Fellowship and traveled to Leticia, Colombia.�� Simen Johan�� The photography of Simen Johan will be on display from Oct. 12 to Dec. 2 in the Brad Cushman Gallery in the Windgate Center of Art and Design. Johan will present a guest lecture at 6 p.m. Friday, Nov. 15, in the Windgate Center Room 101.�� Known for his psychologically charged depictions of the natural world, Johan has expanded his creative universe to include ceramic sculptures, celestial bodies, and detailed compositions that oscillate between bright light and dark shadows.�� The photographer originally drew attention in the early 1990s by merging digital manipulation with traditional darkroom techniques. Since then, he has been developing a hybrid form of image-making that integrates candidly photographed animals and landscapes with a compositional structuring and conceptual intent typically associated with painting and cinema.�� Johan travels near and far to photograph his source material. He finds inspiration anywhere from the local zoo to the jungles of Costa Rica or the lava fields of Iceland. Countless hours are then spent assembling disparate images into a unifying whole as he edits, composes and populates each mise-en-scène.�� The artwork is on loan from the collection of 21C Museum Hotel, Yossi Milo Gallery, and a private collector from Princeton, N.J.�� Anaïs Dassé Artist Anaïs Dassé will create an installation annex titled “Saint George” that will be on display in the Brad Cushman Gallery in the Windgate Center of Art and Design from Oct. 12 to Dec. 2. Dassé, represented by Boswell Mourot Gallery in Little Rock, creates fictitious tableaux, picturing primitive feral youth, as ethnographic material. She playfully imagines things in the context of a larger fictional culture. Dassé creates hierarchies of events and entices viewers into a narrative journey with children and young adults in the forests of Arkansas and Texas.�� She began her career as a scientific illustrator in France. After relocating to Arkansas, she began to address the subjects of religious beliefs, guns, and civilization.�� The upper right photo contains Simen Johah’s 2013 photograph, “Red Monkeys,” that will be on display in the Windgate Center of Art and Design.

Photographers learn historic 19th-century photographic process at ��Vlog��ý Little Rock

Ajani Oyindamola — Wed, 10 Jul 2019 12:54:56 +0000

Erasto Carrananza, a photographer since 1989, has been studying historic photographic processes for more than 15 years.�� “I’m in the middle of my master’s degree in visual arts, and this is one of the four historic photographic processes that I want to use in my final project,” Carrananza said. “That is why I am here to learn this process.” The former architect traveled from his home in Monterey, Mexico, to learn how print photographers use the chemical cyanotype process, a non-toxic, historical light-based printing process discovered in 1842. Joli Livaudais, assistant professor of photography, taught a week-long workshop on the process June 10-14 in the Windgate Center of Art and Design. The workshop is part of ��Vlog��ý Little Rock’s artWORKS Artist Workshops Series, which provides a learning community dedicated to creativity and growth through the making and understanding of the visual arts.�� “This simple and inexpensive technique yields gorgeous handmade prints in Prussian blue and has many options for toning and manipulation of the final print,” Livaudais said. Carrananza’s desire to learn historic photographic processes stems from his desire to preserve these dying arts for the next generation.�� “In 2000, digital photography took flight,” he said. “I don’t like digital photography because I like to use film. At that time, I started to seek printing processes back in the early days of photography. The main reason to learn these processes is to reach the younger generation and not lose the information over time. If just one student learns the process, it’s a win.” Melissa Gill, a professor of drawing and printmaking at Hendrix College, was inspired to learn the chemical cyanotype process after seeing her students use it.

Workshop participants develop photographs in a darkroom at the Windgate Center of Art and Design using a 19th-century photographic process. Photo by Ben Krain.

“I’ve seen my students use this process at Hendrix, and I thought it was so beautiful that I wanted to learn it,” Gill said. “This is working with layers of color, and that is exactly how a printmaker works. I wanted to see how this process could inform my work. Now that I know how it works, I can better advise my students who do this work.” Dave Erickson, a commercial photographer and drone pilot from Milwaukee, traveled from Wisconsin with a friend to attend the workshop. The two have plans to set up a darkroom when they get back to explore the chemical cyanotype process as a hobby.�� “I’ve always had a varied, robust interest in photography,” Erickson said. “I have a lot of respect for people who have mastered this process. There is a lot of artistry involved. It’s not as clean cut as just developing a photograph. It takes a lot of patience.”�� In the upper right photo, ��Vlog��ý Little Rock professor Joli Livaudais, left, works with participants of a week-long art workshop on the chemical cyanotype process. Photo by Ben Krain.

Livaudais’ photography exhibit on display at North Little Rock library

Ajani Oyindamola — Thu, 16 May 2019 17:40:21 +0000

Joli Livaudais, assistant professor of photography, will hold a photography exhibit at the Argenta Branch of the from May 17 to June 15.�� The library is located at 420 Main St., North Little Rock, and is open 9 a.m. to 6 p.m. Monday to Friday and 9 a.m. to 1 p.m. Saturday. The exhibit, “And Then I Will See,” will feature a series of images printed using an historical printing process, gum bichromate, which involves hand coating watercolor paper with a light-sensitive emulsion combined with watercolor pigments in multiple layers to achieve a print. “This highly involved process yields images that are softly focused, surreal in color, and are reminiscent of a constructed memory,” she said. This series is inspired by her father’s search to uncover patterns in the universe that would allow him to win the lottery and achieve financial security for his family. “My mother’s last battle with cancer financially devastated my parents. When she died, my father fixated on his solution to the crisis. He decided he would win the lottery,” Livaudais said. “My father believed there are patterns in the universe and that by studying nature they could be discerned. Things we believe to be random can actually be predicted, if we could account for all of the variables that go into this pattern. He spent the next several years working on uncovering this great truth.” Livaudais’ father analyzed thousands of samples of random numbers. He tracked the astronomical objects and weather patterns. He would buy a single lottery ticket every week, but never won the lottery, concluding that there were “just too many variables to account for.” “When he died, and I sat with the boxes of pages of gridded numbers, I recognized much of myself in the pages – the study of nature in search of something deeper, the same desire for meaning and order,” she said. “In these photographs, I study nature, beauty, and the minutia of my own life and relationships in the context of my father’s data, with all the emotion and ambiguous connections that such a study implies.” The images were captured on black and white film with a lensless pinhole camera and layered with photographs of her father’s numbers.

��Vlog��ý Little Rock to host ‘Puppy Mugs’ photo shoot for dogs March 30

Ajani Oyindamola — Fri, 08 Mar 2019 14:47:04 +0000

The University of Arkansas at Little Rock is offering a chance for man’s best friend to steal the spotlight during the K-9 photo shoot on Saturday, March 30.�� During the “Puppy Mugs” event, student and faculty photographers from ��Vlog��ý Little Rock will take portraits of dogs to raise money for programs in the ��Vlog��ý Little Rock. The pet portrait fundraiser will be held from 10 a.m. to 3 p.m. in the ��Vlog��ý Little Rock Windgate Center of Art and Design. The photographers will use classic solid backdrops and fashion lighting to make each four-legged friend look his or her best. The cost is $25 for two 5×7 pictures or one 8×10 picture or a digital file of the photo. Cash, checks, and credit cards will be accepted. For more information, contact Joli Livaudais at jklivaudais@ualr.edu or 501-916-5110. ��

��Vlog��ý Little Rock to host exhibit on artwork by Jenny Ellerbe

Ajani Oyindamola — Fri, 01 Feb 2019 14:15:10 +0000

The University of Arkansas at Little Rock will host an art exhibit featuring the work of photographer Jenny Ellerbe.�� The show, “Not Atget,” which is free and open to the public, will be on display in the Focus Gallery in the ��Vlog��ý Little Rock Windgate Center of Art and Design from Feb. 2 to March 15. The gallery is open 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. Monday through Friday, 10 a.m. to 1 p.m. Saturday, and 2-5 p.m. Sunday. Ellerbe is a self-taught photographer from Monroe, Louisiana. After a 20-year career as a pediatric intensive care nurse in Connecticut, Ellerbe put down the tools of her previous life and returned to Louisiana, where she started over with a kayak paddle and camera. Her photography features the wetlands of northeastern Louisiana. “For the past several years, I have been developing a long-term study of northeastern Louisiana – the overlooked region that lies between the Mississippi and Ouachita Rivers,” she said. “I have wandered through the vast farmland, rural communities, and ancient earthworks collecting photographs – images that tell the story of this land and what it gives to those of us who live here season after season, generation after generation.” For more information, contact Joli Livaudias at 501-569-3182 or jklivaudais@ualr.edu. The upper right photograph is��Jenny Ellerbe’s photograph, “Greenwood Cemetery.”

��Vlog��ý Little Rock receives more than $750,000 to expand art offerings

Janea Snyder — Thu, 31 Jan 2019 17:11:11 +0000

The University of Arkansas at Little Rock’s Department of Art and Design will expand its art outreach with a $754,108 gift from the Windgate Foundation. Part of the gift will enable the university’s Department of Art and Design to establish a series of educational art workshops for high school students and art teachers around the state and in contiguous states. “The Windgate gift will help us promote excellence in the visual arts by exposing students to both traditional and contemporary arts and bringing students and art educators to experience our program and our facilities,” said Joseph Lampo, director of development and external relations. “Ultimately, we want to help those students who show promising talent become well-trained artists and makers.” New outreach activities will take place during the school year and during the summer at the Windgate Center of Art and Design on the campus of ��Vlog��ý Little Rock. Beginning this summer, the university will offer workshops for junior and senior high school students and art teachers. “These sessions will be designed not only to instruct or train participants in a particular technique or process, but also to introduce them to our highly skilled Department of Art and Design faculty and the up-to-date equipment and facilities of the Windgate Center of Art and Design,” said Thomas Clifton, chair of ��Vlog��ý Little Rock’s Department of Art and Design. A $20.3 million gift from in 2015 enabled ��Vlog��ý Little Rock to construct the Windgate Center of Art and Design, which opened in 2018. The center houses a fine arts foundry and specialized areas for ceramics, digital fabrication, graphic design, jewelry making, illustration, metal fabrication, painting, photography, printmaking, sculpting, woodworking and space for art history and art education. The state’s only programs in furniture design and metalsmithing also are housed in the center. “The Windgate Center of Art and Design is a state-of-the-art facility with an accomplished and passionate faculty, and we are pleased to continue our partnership with ��Vlog��ý Little Rock for their art outreach program,” said Pat Forgy, executive director of the Windgate Foundation. “We encourage high school students and art teachers in Arkansas and beyond to take advantage of this exciting opportunity to visit campus and explore workshops in areas such as woodworking, metal and digital fabrication, ceramics, sculpture, painting, drawing and more. Through these workshops, art teachers will learn the latest techniques and students will be able to discover the numerous possibilities available in pursuing a visual arts education.” During the academic school year, high school art students and their art teachers will be able to spend a day in the department’s studios. Participants will work with ��Vlog��ý Little Rock faculty and have a day of college-level classes. The sessions will begin in fall 2019 and be offered on select Fridays during the semester. Art teachers will have their own summer workshop in which they receive instruction in current art techniques. The ��Vlog��ý Little Rock Art and Design Department is partnering with the , which will assist in recruiting teachers for the workshops. Teachers who participate in the summer workshops will receive support from Thea Foundation for the following school year. Beginning in summer 2021, the university will offer on-campus housing at no charge to students and teachers attending the summer camps. All workshops, including supplies and instructional materials, will be free for students and teachers. Transportation costs will not be covered. “We want this opportunity to be accessible to students and teachers in central Arkansas and beyond,” Lampo said. “By offering residential opportunities, we hope to encourage students and teachers who may not be able to participate otherwise. This is just one way we are expanding our collaboration with the arts community and helping nurture promising careers in the visual arts.”

��Vlog��ý Little Rock to host art exhibit featuring faculty work

Ajani Oyindamola — Wed, 10 Oct 2018 15:35:16 +0000

The University of Arkansas at Little Rock Art Gallery will host its Faculty Biennial Show from Oct. 15 to Nov. 16 in the Brad Cushman Gallery in the Windgate Center of Art and Design.�� The group exhibition features studio art and design created by the faculty members in the ��Vlog��ý Little Rock Department of Art and Design. A reception for the exhibit will be held from 5-7 p.m. on Friday, Oct. 26, in the Windgate Center. The studio disciplines featured in the exhibit include drawing, printmaking, photography, painting, graphic design, metals, ceramics and various sculptural processes. The exhibit is free and open to the public. The galleries in the Windgate Center of Art and Design are open 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. Monday through Friday, 10 a.m. to 1 p.m. Saturday, and 2-5 p.m. Sunday. For more information, contact Gallery Director Brad Cushman at becushman@ualr.edu or 501-916-5103. In the upper right photo,��Joli Livaudais’s 2018 photograph, “Nesting Instincts,” will be one of the pieces in the Faculty Biennial Show.

- University News Archive - ����Vlog��ý Little Rock

����Vlog��ý Little Rock Opens Three New Exhibits at the Windgate Center

National Museum of Women in the Arts selected Livaudais for ‘Women to Watch’ exhibit

Sims pop-up art show to feature Arkansas landscape scenes

����Vlog��ý Little Rock to open three new art exhibits in October

Photographers learn historic 19th-century photographic process at ����Vlog��ý Little Rock

Livaudais’ photography exhibit on display at North Little Rock library

����Vlog��ý Little Rock to host ‘Puppy Mugs’ photo shoot for dogs March 30

����Vlog��ý Little Rock to host exhibit on artwork by Jenny Ellerbe

����Vlog��ý Little Rock receives more than $750,000 to expand art offerings

����Vlog��ý Little Rock to host art exhibit featuring faculty work