ROCKY MOUNT, NORTH CAROLINA – Finding Freedom Through Art by the Art Club at the Nash Correctional Institution will be coloring the walls of Mims Gallery at The Dunn Center on North Carolina Wesleyan University’s campus. This free exhibition will be open to the public from Thursday, May 12 to Friday, August 5. A reception will also be held on Thursday, May 12 from 5:00 – 7:00 p.m.
The purpose of the Art Club at Nash Correctional Institution is to provide academic and technical training for inmates at the Institution. The Art Club offers beginner to advanced classes generated and taught by inmates. For these individuals, art has become a way of life and gives them a way to reconnect with family and friends to heal damaged relationships.
Art transcends all cultural barriers. These classes provide goals to work towards, inspire confidence, promote a strong work ethic, and give better tools to communicate ideas or express emotion. This exhibition will show how current circumstances do not determine your future and how beauty can be found anywhere. It is supported by the North Carolina Arts Council, a division of the Department of Natural and Cultural Resources, as well as by the NC Department of Public Safety.
The Mims Gallery is open during normal business hours Monday through Friday from 10:00 a.m. – 5:00 p.m., during evening performances at The Dunn Center and through special appointments with the Art Curator.
Also, see article from OurJourney2gether.
About The Dunn Center
The Dunn Center is a premier venue for concerts, shows and conferences in eastern NC. Located on the campus of NC Wesleyan University, in the heart of Rocky Mount, The Dunn Center is proud to host the Wesleyan Season Series of cultural events and concerts. In addition to these world-class performances, The Dunn Center features a variety of campus and community events, including Wesleyan Players productions, concerts of the Tar River Swing Band and Orchestra and other various performances by nationally known artists. The Mims Gallery, located within The Dunn Center, hosts a variety of exhibits, including paintings, drawings and sculpture.
Mims Art Gallery at NCWC to Showcase Durham Artist
ROCKY MOUNT, NORTH CAROLINA — Equines and Abstracts, recent paintings by Laura Berendsen Hughes, will soon be adorning the walls of the Mims Art Gallery on the campus of North Carolina Wesleyan University. Durham artist, Laura Berendsen Hughes, is exhibiting her dramatic and monumental silhouettes of horses and abstract expressionist paintings from March 3, 2022 – March 6, 2022. A reception will be held from 5:00-7:00 p.m. on Thursday, March 3 to celebrate the opening of this stunning exhibit.
An acrylic painter, Laura’s recent work features both equines and abstractions. Categorically, her works of art reveal her painterly “dance” (so to speak) between their designedly structure and freedom. Her classical silhouettes of horses are realized in wild color and improvisational brush strokes. With creative skills from many years working as a graphic artist, Laura’s abstract expressionist works engage us with an exciting, tensional equilibrium between hard-edge form and the freeing dynamic of loose brushwork. In both equines and abstract expressionist works, you will see an uncompromising point of excellence found in her exploration of the aesthetic process.
Regarding beauty, Laura states, “Beauty isn’t the same as prettiness. For me, beauty is deeper and must contain chaos, decay and imperfection.” About her work she says, “What looks intuitive and spontaneous in my work actually starts with a computer sketch. As an unapologetic copyist, I steal brush stokes, colors, shapes and techniques from my other paintings… every step of the process is open to new inspiration. I’m a materialist at heart, [ultimately] I love to see what the paint wants to do and let it have a say in what finally shows up!”
Laura has a Bachelor of Fine Arts (BFA) in Sculpture from UNC-Chapel Hill and has worked as a professional graphic designer for several years now. She uses her graphic design expertise as an integral part of the creative process of painting. As an active exhibiting artist in a variety of venues, she is experiencing both recognition and success. Laura is represented by The Carlton Gallery in Banner Elk, NC and The Centerpiece in Raleigh, NC.
About The Dunn Center
The Dunn Center is a premier venue for concerts, shows and conferences in eastern NC. Located on the campus of NC Wesleyan University, in the heart of Rocky Mount, The Dunn Center is proud to host the Wesleyan Season Series of cultural events and concerts. In addition to these world-class performances, The Dunn Center features a variety of campus and community events, including Wesleyan Players productions, concerts of the Tar River Swing Band and Orchestra and other various performances by nationally known artists. The Mims Gallery, located within The Dunn Center, hosts a variety of exhibits, including paintings, drawings and sculpture. The Gallery is open weekdays from 2:00-4:00 p.m., as well as during performances. To learn more, visit dunncenter.com and follow on Facebook.
New Art Exhibit Coming to Mims Art Gallery at NCWC
As a Haliwa-Saponi tribal native, Richardson concentrates much of his photographic work in the Hollister, NC community. His photographs chronicle contemporary history of regional events and the annual tribal powwow where members from a variety of east coast tribes join in fellowship and celebration. A ready-to-serve portrait photographer, he especially values the opportunity to make photographic portraits of tribal elders. In his gallery exhibition, you will see a wide variety of subjects. Portraits of powwows show ceremonial dancers in their colorful, traditional regalia captured in dynamic dance movement.
Ivan’s success and professional reputation have grown since beginning Fotoworkz in 2014. Life itself opens photographic possibilities for him, between family, tribe and twenty-five years as a volunteer fireman. He has regularly exhibited, and received accolades, at the Annual Native American Unity Conference in Raleigh, NC. One of his photographs was featured in the Roanoke Rapids Daily Herald in 2019. He was awarded the front cover of McLane Industries’ MERIT Magazine with one of his colorful powwow photographs. Along with continuing his usual photographic work in portrait and chronicling community events, Ivan is looking forward to expanding his interest into wildlife subjects. This will be his second exhibition at the Mims Art Gallery and many of his photographs will be for sale.
The Mims Art Gallery is open Monday through Friday from 9:00 a.m.–5:00 p.m. and during evening performances at The Dunn Center.
About The Dunn Center
The Dunn Center is a premier venue for concerts, shows and conferences in eastern NC. Located on the campus of NC Wesleyan University, in the heart of Rocky Mount, The Dunn Center is proud to host the Wesleyan Season Series of cultural events and concerts. In addition to these world-class performances, The Dunn Center features a variety of campus and community events, including Wesleyan Players productions, concerts of the Tar River Swing Band and Orchestra and other various performances by nationally known artists. The Mims Gallery, located within The Dunn Center, hosts a variety of exhibits, including paintings, drawings, and sculpture. The Gallery is open weekdays from 2:00-4:00 p.m., as well as during performances. To learn more, visit dunncenter.com and follow on Facebook.
New Art Exhibit Coming to Mims Art Gallery at NCWC
ROCKY MOUNT, NORTH CAROLINA — Recent art works, Fantasy Fantastique by artist Patricia Horne, will soon be transforming Mims Art Gallery at North Carolina Wesleyan University. Her exhibition of colorful paintings, digital prints and sculptures will begin to blanket the gallery walls on October 28, 2021. Open to the public and free admission, come meet Patricia and enjoy refreshments at a reception on Thursday, October 28 from 5:00-7:00 p.m. in The Dunn Center’s Mims Art Gallery. The exhibit will also continue to be showcased Monday – Friday 9:00 a.m.-5:00 p.m. and during evening events until January 3, 2022.
Gallery visitors will be lured in and transported into Patricia Horne’s dreamy world of fairy tales and fantasy, where everyday realities lie somewhere else. The artist shares her own improvisational surprises with the viewer as her cast of people, creatures, plants and planets, each have their unique personas and exist in narrative harmony with one another. Outside of sculpture and traditional painting, the computer has more and more become the perfect medium and paintbrush for Patricia. The immediacy of pictorial form, phosphene color, shape-shifting change, and layering of environment and space keep her flights of fantasy and narratives fresh and alive.
Patricia, a life-long North Carolina native, has raised her family in Fuquay-Varina where she lives with her husband. Since childhood, making art has been one of her favorite things to do. In her teens, she competed at a national contest in NYC where she received the Gold Key Award and honorable mention for a pen and ink entitled “Lady In Command.” After high school, she attended Chowan University between 1982 and 83 and then Hardbager Jr, College from 1983 to 84. Married with the responsibilities of raising a family, she put making art on hold. With children grown and on their own, it was a 2015 Zentangle class in art that recharged her artistic pursuits and ongoing non-stop career. Largely self-taught like so many other greats, she exhibits regionally, accepts commission art projects and is a resident artist in the 311 Gallery.
Don’t miss this opportunity to view Patricia Horne’s work. Her prints and paintings are for sale and will make a favorite addition in a home or special collection.
About The Dunn Center
The Dunn Center is a premier venue for concerts, shows and conferences in eastern NC. Located on the campus of NC Wesleyan University, in the heart of Rocky Mount, The Dunn Center is proud to host the Wesleyan Season Series of cultural events and concerts. In addition to these world-class performances, The Dunn Center features a variety of campus and community events, including Wesleyan Players productions, concerts of the Tar River Swing Band and Orchestra and other various performances by nationally known artists. The Mims Gallery, located within The Dunn Center, hosts a variety of exhibits, including paintings, drawings, and sculpture. The Gallery is open weekdays from 2:00-4:00 p.m., as well as during performances. To learn more, visit dunncenter.com and follow on Facebook.
