At the Vanishing Point
February 9 – May 5, 2013
Public Artist Talk, Opening Reception
Friday, February 8, 6-9pm
The Weatherspoon Art Museum at the University of North Carolina at Greensboro is pleased to present a major solo exhibition, Diana Al-Hadid, from February 9 – May 5, 2013. The exhibition highlights the artist’s unique exploration of art historical references to examine sculptural and pictorial space.
Born in Syria and raised in Ohio, the artist’s haunting works convey a world turned upside down. Her recent large-scale gypsum and metal sculptures, small bronzes, and drawings are inspired by myriad sources, including Italian and Northern Renaissance painting, Gothic architecture, and Hellenistic sculpture. Known for her innovative methods that extend pictorial devices used to convey perspective into three-dimensional space, her works tread on new terrain for contemporary sculpture at the same time as they recover influential visual histories. The exhibition represents the artist’s first museum survey in the U.S. and the publication will be the artist’s first monograph.
The exhibition is organized by Xandra Eden, Curator of Exhibitions, and will be accompanied by a catalogue published by Hatje Cantz featuring essays by Eden and art critic Gregory Volk. The project is made possible through the support of the Andy Warhol Foundation for the Visual Arts, the Elizabeth Firestone Graham Foundation, and ART\Islam, a project of the Thomas S. Kenan Institute for the Arts at the UNC School of the Arts.
For a complete, updated list of related programs, visit http://weatherspoon.uncg.edu.
About the Weatherspoon Art Museum
Mission
The Weatherspoon Art Museum at the University of North Carolina at Greensboro acquires, preserves, exhibits, and interprets modern and contemporary art for the benefit of its multiple audiences, including university, community, regional, and beyond. Through these activities, the museum recognizes its paramount role of public service, and enriches the lives of diverse individuals by fostering an informed appreciation and understanding of the visual arts and their relationship to the world in which we live.
History
The Weatherspoon Art Museum at The University of North Carolina at Greensboro was founded by Gregory Ivy in 1941 and is the earliest of any art facilities within the UNC system. The museum was founded as a resource for the campus, community, and region and its early leadership developed an emphasis—maintained to this day—on presenting and acquiring modern and contemporary works of art. A 1950 bequest from the renowned collection of Claribel and Etta Cone, which included prints and bronzes by Henri Matisse and other works on paper by American and European modernists, helped to establish the Weatherspoon’s permanent collection. Other prescient acquisitions during Ivy’s tenure included a 1951 suspended mobile by Alexander Calder, Woman by Willem de Kooning, a pivotal work in the artist’s career that was purchased in 1954, and the first drawings by Eva Hesse and Robert Smithson to enter a museum collection. In 1989, the museum moved into its present location in The Anne and Benjamin Cone building designed by the architectural firm Mitchell Giurgula. The museum has six galleries and a sculpture courtyard with over 17,000 square feet of exhibition space. The American Association of Museums accredited the Weatherspoon in 1995 and renewed its accreditation in 2005.
Collections + Exhibitions
The permanent collection of the Weatherspoon Art Museum is considered to be one of the foremost of its kind in the Southeast. It represents all major art movements from the beginning of the 20th century to the present. Of the nearly 6,000 works in the collection are pieces by such prominent figures as Sol LeWitt, Robert Mangold, Cindy Sherman, Al Held, Alex Katz, Henry Tanner, Louise Nevelson, Mark di Suvero, Deborah Butterfield, and Robert Rauschenberg. The museum regularly lends to major exhibitions nationally and internationally.
The Weatherspoon also is known for its adventurous and innovative exhibition program. Through a dynamic annual calendar of fifteen to eighteen exhibitions and a multi-disciplinary educational program for audiences of all ages, the museum provides an opportunity for audiences to consider artistic, cultural, and social issues of our time and enriches the life of our university, community, and region.
Weatherspoon Art Museum
The University of North Carolina at Greensboro
Spring Garden and Tate Streets, PO Box 26170
Greensboro, NC 27402-6170, 336.334.5770, weatherspoon@uncg.edu
For more information or press images, contact:
Loring Mortensen, 336-256-1451, lamorten@uncg.edu
