'Septemdimensiva' Art Show Features Seven Graduating UK Seniors
LEXINGTON, Ky. (Dec. 7, 2015) — The University of Kentucky School of Art and Visual Studies presents a group exhibition of the work of seven graduating seniors earning their BA (Bachelor of Arts) in art studio this December. The BA show, "septemdimensiva," opens Dec. 7 and runs through Dec. 11. A reception celebrating the artists will be held 4:30-7:30 p.m. Thursday, Dec. 10, at the Bolivar Art Gallery in the UK Art and Visual Studies Building, located on 236 Bolivar Street. The exhibit and reception are free and open to the public.
"Septemdimensiva" will feature the following soon-to-be graduates: Dallas Conn, Tiffany Graves, Elmer Lopes, Kimberly Parker, Christina Romano, Joshua Sevy and Ashley Worley. The art studio major helps art students gain critical skills for today's society including, but not limited to, the ability to work with still and moving images and the latest software, as well as the manipulation of traditional media and forms of expression as drawing, ceramics, metal sculpture and other intermedia sculptural constructions such as fiber art, photography, video and digital design.
Dallas Conn, a native of Henderson, Kentucky, was raised in Sturgis and Henderson and graduated from Henderson County High School in 2011. He obtained an associate's degree from Henderson Community College. Conn has experience as a commissioned digital artist with a body of freelance graphic design and illustration art work.
Conn's senior portfolio is based on postmodern surrealism, combining inspiration from early surrealists such as Salvador Dali and Zdzislaw Beksinski with modern elements. Using a dream diary, he is able to recall and recreate the fantastic compositions witnessed in his dreams. Conn paints digitally in Photoshop, learning on his own time under an independent study. He is versed in digital photography and creates video art with ambitions of creating and directing music videos for his own music.
Tiffany Graves is from Springfield, Kentucky, where she graduated from Washington County High School. In her high school years she received a grant to participate and create a horse sculpture for the World Equestrian Games. The sculpture was on view at the games along with preview dates at Lexington Green and Kentucky Horse Park: International Museum of the Horse. She also had two of her patriotic pieces hang in the Washington, D.C. Tunnel. In high school, Graves was a member of the art club, participated in marching band, and graduated with honors.
During her career in college, Graves has volunteered at the Kentucky Children’s Hospital where she subsequently worked with children teaching them various techniques in art. The following summer she interned at the Lexington Art League, helping the resident artists with works and installing, and teaching children art at camps. Her art inspiration includes nature and the aspects of manipulating nature. Her preferred medium is Photoshop, and her works tend to either be small or insanely large. Graves also has dabbled in video and animation.
Elmer Lopez works at developing his portfolio as he explores the differences and similarities between two- and three-dimensional work. The curiosity and research within dimensionality has impacted his art practice and his art work to move forward incorporating both drawing and relief. Graduating from DuPont Manual High School with his first group exhibition in 2011, Lopez has increased his art processes even further to demonstrate new development and skills as an artist. The work shown in "septemdimensiva" consists of mix media processes including drawing, painting, ceramics and papier-mâché construction. The motivation for his art is derived from the commonalities and differences of individuals that are connected regardless to race, gender, beliefs and status.
Kimberly Parker is a graduate of Taylor County High School, where she was active in the art club. She holds an associate's degree in art from Bluegrass Technical Community College. Parker's senior portfolio at UK consists of works done in painting, photography and ceramic mediums. The ideas for her work spring from cultural or social issues that surround women. Parker is inspired by projects that seem out of the ordinary in order to catch the viewer’s attention. She works in a variety of scale in photographs and oil paintings.
Christina Romano is a Kentucky-born artist who strives for growth and expression in her art and in everyday life. Romano knew from a young age that she loved to create, but it was not until she participated in the International Baccalaureate Visual Arts at Sacred Heart Academy that she knew she wanted to pursue art as a potential career. At UK, Romano has studied both art studio and art education in hopes of becoming an art teacher in addition to creating her own works. She strives to integrate her creativity into everything she does; whether that is through contributing her artistic skills to volunteer activities, holding multiple design positions in her sorority, or indulging her personal hobby of costume design and construction.
Romano’s senior portfolio is a collection of works that reflects her artistic journey and development. By drawing inspiration from her studies, interests and personal experiences, each of her works can be seen as a self-portrait. Common themes in her work are childhood development, femininity, mental health and freedom of artistic expression. Her works often refer to pop and mass culture; Romano uses comic book characters, fashion magazines, and Internet memes as sources of inspiration. Her work can seem eccentric and quirky and at other times ironic as if pointing at the strangeness in everyday culture and laughing at its absurdity.
Josh Sevy is a local photographer and sculptor. He works primarily in metal, wood and non-traditional photography, integrating traditional woodworking techniques (carpentry and furniture making) and traditional photography (cyanotype) and metalworking (casting, forging and fabrication) methods along with modern technique and technology to create art objects, which focus on the creation of self and identity.
Sevy's work was influenced by travels throughout the United States and Japan, where he witnessed the broad range of subcultures across the countries, the people and experiences encountered along the way, as well as his study of culture and art history. Strongly influenced by current events across the globe, particularly the strife caused by religion, the intent behind the creation of his objects is the depiction of a common human experience through the conceptual art object, to compel his viewers to consider the possibility of reaching amity in the world by viewing life from others' perspectives.
Ashley Worley is a senior pursuing degrees in both art education and art studio. She is the recipient of the Governors Scholars Program Presidential Scholarship and has made the Dean’s List every semester at UK. As an undergraduate, Worley has participated in several exhibitions, including the Carey Ellis Exhibit, University Open and Young Artists Competition. She holds a leadership position as vice president of the university's Art Education Student Chapter, where she organized a long-term community service project for students to volunteer at Kentucky Children's Hospital to paint the windows in the Pediatric Intensive Care Unit. Worley is also an editor and manager for the UK undergraduate arts journal, Shale.
The concepts behind Worley's body of work revolve around the delicate and vulnerable relationship existing between humans and nature. Worley's interest in environmental issues encouraged her to explore this concept of the human vs. nature power struggle. Her work draws inspiration from the organic, aesthetic qualities of fungi, bacteria and seeds. Worley's work strives to provoke conflicting feelings of fear and curiosity. Whether through painting, drawing, photography, print, or sculpture the artist's work portrays a tension that exists between our desire to live harmoniously with nature and the fear that we are susceptible and exposed to its influence.
For more information about "septemdimensiva," contact Ashley Worley at ashley.worley@uky.edu.
The UK School of Art and Visual Studies in the UK College of Fine Arts is an accredited member of the National Association of Schools of Art and Design and offers undergraduate and graduate degrees in the fields of art studio, art history and visual studies, and art education.
MEDIA CONTACT: Whitney Hale, 859-257-8716; whitney.hale@uky.edu