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Exhibition: April 8 -- May 15, 2005
Members' Preview and Opening Reception: April 8th, 2005
Master Class: May 9-13, 2005
Where: The Arts Center, 719 Central Ave. St. Pete, FL 33701
EXHIBIT INFORMATION
The Arts Center St. Petersburg is proud to present an exhibition documenting the intensely personal journey of three artists as they tackle themes of cultural separation, shattered familial ties, and nostalgia for a distant homeland.
The exhibition features Maria Emilia and Maria Brito, two Cuban-American artists whose paintings, installations, and sculptures examine personal histories of displacement, loss and the struggle for cultural identity.
Both artists left Cuba at an early age -- Emilia in 1961 under Operation Peter Pan -- and have retained against all odds an extraordinarily strong sense of artistic heritage.
Another component of the exhibition features Jean Claude Legagneur. One of Haiti's foremost artists, Legagneur employs the vivid tapestry of his homeland in an exhibit of vibrant acrylic works. Students will also be able to enroll in a master artist class focusing on still-lifes taught by Legagneur, with an emphasis on the selection of a composition which best conveys the essence of a subject.
ARTIST INFORMATION
Maria Emilia: Life Performances 2002 - 05
Born in Cuba during the 1940s, Maria Emilia was exiled to the U.S. in 1961 under Operation Peter Pan. The anxiety of separation from her family and homeland is a frequent theme in her works, which include installations, sculpture, painting and drawings. Her latest drawings, paintings and photographic negatives are the focus of this exhibition, consisting of collaged paper and charcoal, and monochromatic canvases depicting the journey of her altar ego through various stages of life. Emilia's works have been widely exhibited at various museums, including the Smithsonian Museum in Washington and the Florida Gulf Coast Museum of Art. She has also curated numerous exhibitions, including two at the Salvador Dali Museum and the University of South Florida's Contemporary Art Museum. She received an Individual Artist Fellowship in 1997.
Maria Brito: Reflections on the Human Condition
Maria Brito is a Cuban-American artist who left her island home as a child in 1961 at the age of 13 and carried her heritage in her art. Brito works in such diverse media as installation, ceramics, sculpture, painting and collage. She holds an MFA from the University of Miami and a BFA from Florida International University. In 1988 she was commissioned to produce a sculpture for the Olympic Park in Seoul, Korea, and has also exhibited at the Studio Museum in Harlem, the High Museum in Atlanta, and the Herbert F. Johnson Museum of Art at Cornell University. Her work deals with the tortured agony of the self in search of identity and her personal history of displacement and loss. She currently resides in Miami, where she is represented by Bernice Steinbaum Gallery. The exhibition will include self-portrait paintings, sculpture, and installation.
Jean-Claude LeGagneur: Vivid Perspectives
Jean-Claude Legagneur studied at the Art Instruction School in Chicago, the Brooklyn Museum and the Art Students League in New York. His vibrant acrylic paintings of people and still-lifes have been exhibited internationally and are in numerous permanent collections, including the Museum of the Vatican, the Museum of Mupana, Port-au-Prince, and American Airlines. He currently makes his home in Haiti, where he is known for being a leading member of the "École de La Beauté" -- a formal, socially engaged vision of art informed by its rupture with other indigenous, politically-motivated Haitian art.
