People typically think of dance as movements and action, but the DANCE exhibition at the Walsh Art Gallery at the Regina A. Quick Center for the Arts will showcase dance through a different medium — visual art.
Photographs, paintings and even sculptures will be featured in the gallery.
Philip Trager, an internationally renowned photographer from Fairfield, Connecticut who has published a book of photographs of dancers, will have photos on exhibit.
His photographs, although stationary, exude the movement and energy of dance.
They are beautiful visual representations and are sure to make the exhibitions entertaining.
Even more exciting, some of the photography of Philip Trager that will be featured was taken right here on campus.
Paintings from Jane Sutherland and sculptures from Marc Mellon will also be display.
Sutherland, also a Fairfield artist of national recognition, had done a series of paintings and drawings based on Edgar Degas’ “Little Dancer of Fourteen Years” sculpture.
This is a clever way to incorporate Degas, arguably the most famous artist to visualize dance, in the exhibitions. Sutherland’s paintings bring his work to life.
Mellon, whose sculptures will be featured, is a nationally-renowned sculptor from Fairfield County who has done a series of sculptures in bronze of dancers.
Along with the works of these artists being displayed, there will be a series of performances at the Quick Center that will focus on dance, such as performances by David Dorfman Dance and the dance talents of Ronald K. Brown, an acclaimed performer who combines traditional African dance with more contemporary choreography.
With works by gifted artists like Mellon, Sutherland and Trager, along with the additional performance component, the exhibitions are sure to be beautiful, unique and entertaining.
Carey Mack Weber, the museum and collections manager of Fairfield University Museums, spoke on the difficulties of expressing dance in a visual way.
“Each of the artists in the exhibitions definitely expresses it differently. Dance is a physical expression, and visual art is static, so it is a challenge that each of these artists had to deal with.”
According to Weber, this is the first time that the Walsh Art Gallery and the Quick Center have collaborated.
“We’re very excited about the collaboration with the Quick Center,” Weber added.
“We’ve never done that before in the history of the Walsh Art Gallery or the Quick Center.”
“[The Quick Center] has come up with some great dance programming, we’re going to have some gallery talks with the artists and there’s an OVF lecture with Judith Jamison of Alvin Ailey fame. It’s going to be a fall full of dance,” Weber mentioned with excitement.
The collaboration came about with the ideas of the former Director of University Museums Jill Deupi, who was inspired by the works of Trager, Sutherland and Mellon.
“Jill had the great idea to put these three artists together and explore how each of them looked at dance through their work,” said Weber.
After this, Weber collaborated with Assistant Director of Programming and Audience Development at the Quick Center Lori Jones to expand the exhibitions to the Quick Center programming.
Weber is hopeful that the DANCE exhibitions will be more popular than Walsh Gallery exhibitions in the past which, unfortunately, have not been well attended by students.
When asked about the low attendance rates, Weber commented, “We’re not sure why there’s not more student interest in the exhibitions. We’re not sure whether it’s that they don’t know about them, that we’re not reaching them with our promotional materials, or whether they’re truly not interested. I would like to think that they just don’t know about them.”
Weber added, “The nice thing about the Gallery being in the Quick Center is that it’s always open an hour before any of the performances there, so if you’re going to the dance performances you can also go and see the exhibitions.”
There will be an opening reception on Sept. 17 from 6-8 p.m., which will be free to the public.
Artist oratories will take place from September to November featuring Jane Sutherland on Sept. 21, Philip Trager on Oct. 21 and Marc Mellon on Nov. 10.
The exhibition will run Sept. 18 to Jan. 15.
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