FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

Contact: Cindy Deppe, media relations, 641-269-4834

January 7, 2008

21 PORTUGUESE ARTISTS FEATURED IN GRINNELL’S FAULCONER GALLERY EXHIBITION OPENING FEB. 1

Grinnell College’s Faulconer Gallery will feature works by 21 emerging and mid-career Portuguese artists in a multimedia exhibition titled "Where are you from? Contemporary Portuguese Art" ("De onde vens? Arte Contemporânea de Portugal"). The exhibition opens Feb. 1 with many of the artists on hand in Iowa.

According to Faulconer Gallery Director Lesley Wright, the exhibition uses the question "where are you from?" to explore and unify a range of Portuguese art. Wright and collaborator Jane Gilmor, professor of art at Mount Mercy College, traveled to Portugal in 2006 and 2007 to bring together an exhibition of artists who "would never be seen together as a group in Portugal, primarily because curators from Iowa see the Portuguese art world through different filters," Wright said.

"On our trips we learned that Portuguese artists see themselves as part of a larger, global art world, while also identifying closely with their Portuguese heritage. By asking the question ‘where are you from?’ we welcomed them to give a variety of answers." Among the works on view will be a documentary of a Portuguese family; an adult-sized dollhouse presenting reconsidered fairy tales; a cityscape beneath an inflating and deflating nylon bubble; wheat growing on a Bible; a video made of hundreds of album covers; a work based on the sardine industry; and a refugee’s cart.

Major support for the exhibition has been provided by the Instituto Camoes, which promotes the presentation of Portuguese culture around the world. The bilingual exhibition catalogue, which includes essays by Wright, Gilmor, and Portuguese critic Miguel van Hafe Perez, explores the connection between the artists’ works, their personal and geographic identity, and their explorations of culture, history, and family through art. Translations were provided by the Instituto Camoes and the Portuguese Embassy in Washington, D.C.

Throughout February, Faulconer Gallery will host the following events related to the exhibition:

Feb. 1: Panel discussion on contemporary art in Portugal at 4:15 p.m. with exhibition artists describing their works (snow date: Feb. 2 at 4:15 p.m.); opening reception at 5:30 p.m. in the Bucksbaum Center Rotunda (snow date: Feb. 2 at 5:30 p.m.).

Feb. 2: Community Day at 1 p.m. with hands-on activities and storytelling related to the exhibition’s core question, "where are you from?"

Feb. 5: Artist’s talk by sculptor and video artist Nuno Pedrosa at 4:15 p.m. in Lawson Lecture Hall.

Feb. 10: Artist’s talk by Marta de Menezes and scientist Luis Graca about the intersection of art and science at 2 p.m. in Lawson Lecture Hall.

Feb. 14: Artist’s talk by new media artist Jose Carlos Teixeira on "Geographies and Other Ethnographies: Between Context and Identity" at 4:15 p.m. in Lawson Lecture Hall.

All events are in Faulconer Gallery unless otherwise noted. Curator of Academic and Community Outreach Tilly Woodward will coordinate the gallery programming; exhibition designer is Grinnell graduate Milton Severe.

The Portuguese exhibition will be on display Feb. 1-April 20 in the Faulconer Gallery of the Bucksbaum Center for the Arts at 1108 Park St. on the Grinnell College campus. Gallery hours for the exhibition are Sunday-Wednesday, noon to 5 p.m., and Thursday-Saturday, 10 a.m. to 8 p.m. For more information or directions, call 641-269-4660 or visit www.grinnell.edu/faulconergallery. Additional works by Portuguese artists will be featured in related exhibitions at Mount Mercy College and the University of Northern Iowa.

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