NEWS

Louisiana Tech’s School of Art galleries will host three photography exhibitions from Tuesday, March 23 through Monday, April 12.

Kathleen Robbins and Jacinda Russell will show in the Main Gallery, and Christa Bowden will exhibit in the Bellocq Gallery. An opening reception will be held from 5-6:30 p.m. Tuesday, March 23 in the School of Art Galleries lobby with a lecture preceding the reception by Kathleen Robbins at 4 p.m. in Visual Arts Center 103.

Robbins, an associate professor of art at the University of South Carolina in Columbia, earned an MFA in photography from the University of New Mexico in 2001. She grew up in the Mississippi Delta, where “The Art of Arranging Things” was photographed. This exhibition explores familial obligation and conflicted relationships with home. This series of photographs weave together Robbins’s memories with those of friends and family, combining a sense of personal history with a broader visual concept of the American South. This project is made possible with support from the Institute for Southern Studies at the University of South Carolina. Some of Robbins family, who are featured in the exhibition, will attend the reception. More information can be found at www.kathleen-robbins.com.

Russell received her MFA from the University of Arizona in 1999 and teaches at Ball State University in Muncie Indiana as assistant professor of photography. “Strange Artifacts: A Photographic and Found Object Wunderkammer” relies heavily on the visual aesthetic of a 16th century European cabinet of curiosity. Wunderkammer means “room of wonder.” The 50 archival inkjet prints on canvas are found objects influential in Russell’s childhood and adult years. The photographs, encased in weathered boxes, suitcases, drawers and crates, range in subject from false teeth to jars of paint chips to sculpted cotton. To see more of Russell’s work, visit jacindarussell.com.

Bowden, an assistant professor of art, started the photography program at Washington and Lee University in Lexington Virginia in 2006. She earned her MFA from the University of Georgia and is the recipient of a 2009-2010 Virginia Museum of Fine Arts fellowship. The exhibition, “Still Flight,” explores the use of a flatbed scanner as a camera. The work depicts in detail various winged insects such as moths, butterflies and dragonflies. Bowden’s work can be viewed at www.scannerobscura.com

The Louisiana Tech Art Galleries are located in the Visual Arts Center between Tech Drive and Mayfield Street, next to the Natatorium, and across from A.E. Phillips School. The galleries are open weekdays from 9 a.m. to 4 p.m. and admission is free. For more information please call the School of Art at (318) 257-3909.

Written by Judith Roberts