RCVA hosts senior exhibit

By Sebastian Fryer
Arts Editor

Beginning today, the Richmond Center for Visual Arts will host senior art student Ryan Crawley’s Bachelor of Fine Arts thesis show, “I Am This City.”

The exhibit, which Crawley described as a combination of painting and sculpture, will be on display in the Eleanor R. and Robert A. DeVries Student Art Gallery until Friday, Feb. 26.

“It’s made of flat paintings put together as a box that people can walk through,” Crawley said. “It’s kind of weird to explain.”

“I Am This City” portrays a cityscape, but Crawley described his piece as abstract.
“[The paintings] kind of represent buildings,” Crawley said. “There’s a really strong background color, using other colors to build a cityscape.”

Crawley stated that the artistic style of his piece could be described as abstract expressionist.

“It’s more about the brush strokes, building up the image, even though most of the time, [abstract expressionists] have no recognizable form in the work,” Crawley said.

Crawley added that as a work of abstract expressionism, “I Am This City” emphasizes brush strokes, color, and thick paint.

Crawley also found inspiration in large cities he has driven through in the past.
“I would always drive through Chicago,” Crawley said. “Big cities have always been intriguing to me.”

While his work began as paintings, Crawley said that the project eventually evolved into something different.

“It started off with me painting cityscapes, which turned more into making these sculptures,” Crawley said.

The exhibit will wrap up on Friday with a closing reception, which takes place from 5 to 8 p.m. Crawley will be in attendance.

“We’re going to have refreshments and snacks,” Crawley said. “If people have questions about the work they can just come over and talk to me and [tell me] what they think.”

Crawley is eager for students to see the exhibition.

“[Students] should be interested [in attending] because it’s amazing,” Crawley said. “Having [all the paintings] together and seeing them all up, it’s really a different approach to doing something. I think they should be interested in coming.”

The RCVA will also host a metals and jewelry B.F.A. exhibition by Jason Spicko titled “Mechanical Craft” and a ceramics B.F.A. exhibition by Sarah Newberry titled “Unseen Serenity.”

The three exhibits will be on display in the Richmond Center for Visual Arts from Monday, Feb. 22 to Thursday, Feb. 25 from 10 a.m. to 6 p.m. and Friday, Feb. 26 from 10 a.m. to 9 p.m.

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Posted by heraldstaff on Feb 21 2010. Filed under A & E. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0. You can leave a response or trackback to this entry

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