News Release

Local angles: Greensboro; Dothan, Ala.; Lawrenceville, Ga.;
Carver, Mass.; Cleveland, Ohio; Lancaster, Pa.;
Hilton Head, S.C.; Lynchburg, Va.

For immediate use April 12, 2005 -- No. x

By MARIA GLOEGGLER
Ackland Art Museum

CHAPEL HILL – Portraits, photographs and more by eight master’s of fine arts students at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill will be displayed from Thursday (April 14) to May 15 at UNC’s Ackland Art Museum.

An opening reception for "New Currents in Contemporary Art" will be held from 5:30 p.m. to 7 p.m. Friday (April 15). The students will discuss their work in a gallery talk at 12:15 p.m. April 27. Both events will be at the museum and free to the public. Admission also is free at the Ackland, open 10 a.m.-5 p.m. Wednesdays through Saturdays and 1-5 p.m. Sundays.

"Time and labor are recurring themes of this year’s exhibition," said Christine Huber, assistant curator of exhibitions at the museum. "Imagination, wit, inventive use of forms and painstaking attention to detail characterize the work."

The eight student artists, all graduating next month with master’s degrees in studio art, are Leah Bailis of Cleveland,Ohio; David Colagiovanni of Carver, Mass.; Jerstin Crosby of Dothan, Ala.; Lany Devening of Lynchburg, Va.; Nathaniel Lang of Lawrenceville, Ga.; Sonia Landwehr of Hilton Head, S.C.; Lydia Moyer of Lancaster County, Pa.; and Susan Summers Mullally of Greensboro.

Visitors will see their imagination manifested in 28 works including:

• sculptural portraits of houses, forming a miniature village;
• layers of pastel-colored blocks mimicking the stems of cacti, with upturned feet drawn on a wall as the branches;
• silk screens of houses, all of them on fire, representing each of the 50 states and set against their typical landscapes;
• rotating video images of an artist and his father, projected onto sculptures, titled "turning into my dad"; and video of flying swallows, suspended overhead; and
• egg tempura portraits.

The Ackland is on South Columbia Street near Franklin Street. For more information, call 919-966-5736 or 919-962-0837 (TTY), or visit the Web site at www.ackland.org.

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Ackland contact: Amanda Hughes, 919-843-3592

News Services contact: L.J. Toler, 919-962-8589