Belmont University’s Leu Art Gallery has announced its next exhibition, Myth and Meaning: Recent Paintings by Greg Decker, which begins in early October at the gallery. Decker is a figurative painter, producing oil paintings which are often ‘mythical’ in content, as well as portraits and still-lifes.
“This exhibit is a wonderful opportunity to exhibit paintings which embody themes I have been exploring for a long time, particularly the theme of Paradise,” says Decker, a professional artist who recently moved to Nashville from New York City to begin his own series of workshops in traditional painting.
“I am a narrative painter, and I hope that my love for ‘story’ and thematic meaning in painting comes through in these paintings. I love color and solid form, texture and light. I am grateful to partake of the grand themes of Western painting, themes which to me are still vibrant and utterly contemporary.”
Decker holds two Master of Fine Arts Degrees, one from Cranbrook Academy of Fine Art, and one from the New York Academy of Art, and he has studied at Oxford University in England. In New York, Decker taught at the Museum of Modern Art, the Brooklyn Museum of Art, and the Metropolitan Museum of Art.
The exhibition of Decker’s paintings begins Oct. 3, 2005, and continues through Dec. 6, 2005. Gallery hours for the Decker exhibition are 9 a.m. to 6 p.m. Monday through Saturday and 2 p.m. to 6 p.m. Sunday. Admission is free.
There will be a reception celebrating the opening of the exhibition at the Leu Art Gallery, 4 p.m., Oct. 6
Currently at the Leu
The Leu Art Gallery’s current exhibition is The Appeal of Wood-Turning featuring the wood-turnings of two of Tennessee’s best artists in the form, John Jordan and Brenda Stein.
Contemporary wood art covers a diverse range of wood forms: turned-wood vessels, assembled wood forms, furniture and sculpture. This exhibit features some of the best wood-turners in Tennessee. Jordan and Stein represent a variety of techniques of turned wood, an art form in which great care is taken to ensure that the grain and the wood itself are aligned to form the individual vessels.
“The pieces I make are simple but finely detailed vessels,” Jordan says. “Manipulating the color and patterns in the wood to complement the form, and the texturing and carving to create visual and tactile contrasts are important parts of the process and the result. What I feel is most important is the intangible quality that the piece is “right” that comes with putting emotion and feeling into the work.
“A simple object can be very powerful and emotional just for what it is. These pieces are simply decorative vessels that reflect my interest in surface textures/contrasts and form and the personal responses that I have to them, which I suspect are similar to the feelings that makers of decorative objects have felt for thousands of years,” Jordan says.
“Many of the woods that I use are from the dump, construction sites etc. I find great satisfaction in creating elegant objects from material that was destined to be buried or burned,” he says.
The Leu Art Gallery is located inside the Lila D. Bunch Library on the campus of Belmont University. All art exhibits at the Leu are free and open to the public. For more information on gallery exhibits, please contact Victoria Boone, Director of the Leu Art Gallery at 615-460-6770.
