Courtney Taylor, the new curator for The Arts & Science Center for Southeast Arkansas, poses with one of the fiber art pieces she installed for her first show assignment here “Women to Watch 2013.” (Special to The Commercial/William Harvey)
One of the works of art from “Women to Watch” at The Arts & Science Center for Southeast Arkansas, where the work of five Arkansas women artists, working in fiber media, will be on display through April 13. (Special to The Commercial/William Harvey)
Kaye Crippen, left, and Inez Green check out the fiber art pieces on display during the “Women to Watch” reception. (Special to The Commercial/William Harvey)
The Arts & Science Center for Southeast Arkansas, 701 Main St., hosted an opening reception Thursday for “Women to Watch 2013”, a project of the Arkansas State Committee of the National Museum of Women in the Arts, which is a non-profit volunteer organization established as an affiliate of the National Museum of Women in the Arts (NMWA), located in Washington, D.C.
The exhibit features five Arkansas women artists working in fiber media and will be on display through April 13. The theme this year is inventive textile-based works and features the work of Louise M. Halsey of Little Rock, Barbara Cade of Hot Springs Jennifer Libby Fay, formerly of Rogers, Jane Hartfield of Fort Smith, and Deborah Kuster of Conway. Curator Caroline S. Brown selected the women featured in the exhibit.
Halsey was chosen by the National Museum of Women in the Arts to show her work in the exhibition “High Fiber-Women to Watch 2012” in Washington, D.C., which was on view from Nov. 2, 2012-Jan. 6, 2013. Halsey graduated with her master of fine arts in interdisciplinary art from Goddard College in Vermont in 2007, but began studying weaving in 1971. She has traveled and studied weaving extensively in Mexico, Guatemala, Ecuador, the United Kingdom, Spain, Italy, Paris and Costa Rica. Halsey creates woven tapestries as small commentaries on life.
Cade is showing felted and mixed media works, while Fay’s “textile paintings” explore the relationship between art, nature and spirituality.
Hartfield’s hand-dyed and painted quilts explore color relationships, and Kuster, a professor of art at the University of Central Arkansas, creates art quilts whose creation goes beyond the loom.
The National Museum of Women in the Arts brings recognition to the achievements of women artists of all periods and nationalities by exhibiting, preserving, acquiring and researching art by women and by teaching the public about their accomplishments.
“Women to Watch” 2013 will travel to the Fort Smith Regional Arts Museum from May 2-July 7; the Walton Arts Center in Fayetteville from July 18-Aug. 17; The Stephens Gallery at the University of the Ozarks in Clarksville from Sept. 4-Oct. 22; the Fine Arts Center Gallery at Arkansas State University in Jonesboro from Nov. 5-29; and the Butler Center for Arkansas Studies in Little Rock from Dec. 13-February 2014.
New curator
Courtney Taylor, the A&S Center’s new curator of collections and exhibitions, greeted attendees to the opening reception.
Taylor’s first task upon joining the ASC team was to hang the “Women to Watch 2013” exhibition. Taylor holds a bachelor’s degree in history and art history and a master’s degree in museum studies. Her curatorial experience includes the Gilcrease Museum, the Philbrook Museum of Art, and most recently, the Museum of Contemporary Art in Jacksonville, Fla.
The Arts & Science Center is open 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. Monday through Friday, 1-4 p.m. Saturday, and is closed on Sunday. For more information, contact ASC at 870-536-3375, info@artssciencecenter.org or visit the website at www.ArtsScienceCenter.org.
