Viviane Le Courtois' Single sock fossil installation will be exhibited in DU's Myhren Gallery Jan. 10 to Feb. 24.
The “Juried Student/Alumni Exhibition” opens Jan. 10 at DU’s Myhren Gallery, featuring works by School of Art and Art History students and alumni. The show’s theme is contemporary approaches to art making.
Robert Gratiot (MFA ’73) likes the challenge of painting multiple plains of space. For example, inMax’ims, his painting of a Greeley, Colo., storefront Gratiot paints so clearly it seems almost like a photograph.
“When people say I change the way they look at things, often places that they walk by every day, I take it as an extreme compliment,” he says.
Two of Gratiot’s works will be displayed in the exhibition, along with 19 other artists.
Alumna Viviane Le Courtois’ works are certainly contemporary. Her Single sock fossil installation features hundreds of lost socks, while her 5-foot sculpture Shane is made of paper maché and marshmallows.
“Both pieces explore contemporary culture and give it a humoristic commentary in original ways,” says Courtois (MA ’00). “By looking at the world around me, in my own closet or classroom, in the streets and supermarkets, I see all the junk food, obese kids, and find that everyone is too busy to cook, take care of themselves and especially too busy to keep track of their own socks.”
Dan Jacobs, gallery director and curator of DU’s art collections, and Lisa Tamiris Becker, University of Colorado Art Gallery director, juried the exhibit.
“We chose works that are powerful, thought-provoking, ingenious, engaging — and subjectively beautiful, too,” Jacobs says.
An opening reception will take place Thursday, Jan. 10, 5–8 p.m. The exhibit runs through Feb. 24.