Metamorphoses: Pictures by Audrey Flack

Mary H. Dana Women Artists Series
Metamorphoses: Pictures by Audrey Flack
2011-2012 Estelle Lebowitz Visiting Artists in Residence Exhibition

Public Lecture by Audrey Flack, “Recent Pages from an Ancient Past”
Tuesday April 3, Reception 5-5:30pm, Lecture 5:30-6:30pm
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Free and open to the public

New Brunswick, NJ- The renowned American realist painter and sculptor, Audrey Flack will be the featured artist in The Mary H. Dana Women Artists Series Galleries at Rutgers University from January 18 – June 30, 2012. This exhibition of works on paper-many of which have never been exhibited before-is curated by Judith K. Brodsky and Ferris Olin (directors of the IWA & curators of the Women Artists Series). Flack has also been named the 2011-2012 Estelle Lebowitz Visiting Artist in Residence at Rutgers and will give a public lecture at 5:30 pm on Tuesday, April 3 in the Douglass Library at Rutgers. The lecture will be preceded by a reception in honor of the artist at 5 pm.

The exhibition is a combination of prints, drawings, and photographs by Flack that highlight her pioneering photorealism but also her roots in classical sculpture. Her philosophical use of the mystical and the myth is seen in such series as The Art Muse and Recent Pages from an Ancient Past. Phyllis Braff wrote in the New York Times: “At different times over the centuries artists have turned to classical and mythological motifs to validate contemporary ideas. In Audrey Flack’s sculpture, feminist themes are linked to historical sources. The woman as hero is central, and she is elevated to the role of divine goddess.” Flack’s female figures also are based on the polychromed carved holy figures in Spanish churches.

Flack’s work is represented in the collections of major museums throughout the world, among them the New York institutions, Metropolitan Museum of Art, Museum of Modern Art (a painting by Flack was the first photorealist work acquired by MoMA), the Guggenheim Museum, and the Whitney Museum of American Art. Among her public commissions are a Monumental Gateway to the city of Rock Hill, South Carolina, consisting of four twenty-foot tall bronze figures on granite pedestals, and Islandia, a nine-foot tall bronze sculpture for the New York City technical college in Brooklyn New York. There are numerous books on her work, including the monograph, Breaking the Rules by Thalia Gouma Peterson (Abrams Publishing Company, NY). Flack is the author of Art and Soul: Notes on Creating (Compass) and is represented by Gary Snyder Gallery, New York.

The Dana Women Artists Series is a program of the Rutgers Institute for Women and Art (IWA) in partnership with the Rutgers University Libraries. Founded in 1971 by Joan Snyder, The Mary H. Dana Women Artists Series is the oldest continuous running exhibition space in the United States dedicated to making visible the work of emerging and established contemporary women artists. Series co-sponsors include the Rutgers University Office of the Associate Vice President for Academic and Public Partnerships in the Arts and Humanities, Associate Alumnae of Douglass College, Douglass Residential College, and The Feminist Art Project.

The exhibition and lecture is made possible in part by the National Endowment for the Arts and the New Jersey State Council on the Arts/Department of State, a Partner Agency of the National Endowment for the Arts.

The Dana Women Artist Series Galleries are located in the Mabel Smith Douglass Library, 8 Chapel Drive, New Brunswick, NJ 08901. Gallery hours are Monday through Friday 9am – 4:30pm and weekends by appointment. The galleries and lecture are free and open to the public.

The Institute for Women and Art welcomes all visitors with disabilities.
Please contact the IWA for further details and information regarding
accommodation of specific needs at: womenart.rutgers.edu or 732-932-3726.