Art of Nancy Bowen on Display at Peeler Center, February 6 - March 23

January 14, 2012

DePauw University's Richard E. Peeler Art Center presents Nancy Bowen: Begettings, an exhibition which opens Monday, February 6, and will remain on view through Friday, March 23. The artist will be on campus for a talk and reception on Monday, March 5, from 4 to 6 p.m. Both the exhibition and program are free and open to all. (at right: Ben Harding’s Voice, 2011, digital print on rice paper, wood, ceramics, tape and mixed media, dimensions variable [c. 9 ft. x 12 ft. x 12 ft.])

Nancy Bowen utilizes imagery from Farmer's Almanacs, published between 1800 and 1867 (all from the collection of her father, an amateur historian and genealogist), in recent works on paper and in site-specific drawings. In these drawings, she collages imagery and text from the publications with rubbings of early American tombstones and linear patterns suggestive of Eastern origins.

In Blue Angel, she begins with a constructed ground of colorful almanac entries and builds layers, including a voluptuous blue grave rubbing and a circular maze pattern stitched with black thread and marked by colorful dots at each intersection. (at left: Mask, 2011, mixed media, paper and shells,  50 x 36 x 10 inches)

Bowen's sculptural pieces incorporate cast and blown glass elements into clay, steel, and mixed media constructions. In Plots, the interlocked white plaster forms are draped by a delicate web of beadwork and further combined with porcelain towers.

In an essay written for the exhibition, critic Nancy Princenthal writes, "These sculptures brim with implicit, but not quite decipherable, spiritual power. In other words, they urge the questions raised by the works on paper: what recommends itself as auspicious? What compels belief? What serves in our negotiations with fate?"

Nancy Bowen has had solo exhibitions throughout the United States and Europe including the Lesley Heller Gallery, Annina Nosei Gallery in NYC, Galerie Farideh Cadot in Paris, the Betsy Rosenfield gallery in Chicago, and the James Gallery in Houston, among others. Her work has been reviewed widely in such journals as Art in America, Artforum, Glass and Sculpturemagazines, and a host of newspapers. She has won awards from the National Endowment for the Arts, the New York Foundation for the Arts and the European Ceramic Work Center.

Bowen received a B.F.A. from the School of the Art Institute of Chicago and an M.F.A. from Hunter College (CUNY). She is currently an associate professor of pculpture at Purchase College, State University of New York. (at right: Pyre, 2011, ceramic, glass, steel and wax, c. 12 feet high by 3 feet diameter)

The galleries at the Richard E. Peeler Art Center are located at 10 West Hanna Street in Greencastle. They are open Monday-Friday 10 a.m. – 4 p.m.; Saturday 11 a.m. - 5 p.m.; and Sunday 1 – 5 p.m., and are closed during University breaks and holidays.

Visit the Peeler Center's website for more information Learn more here, or contact Craig Hadley, curator of University galleries and collections, at (765) 658-6556 or craighadley@depauw.edu.

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