UMass Kinney Center Features Exhibit by Renaissance of the Earth Artist in Residence Brandon Graving through Sept. 20
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Elusive Prize: Wonder, Wing, & Transmutation, an exhibit by Renaissance of the Earth Artist in Residence Brandon Graving, is on display now through Sept. 20 at the Arthur F. Kinney Center for Renaissance Studies, 650 E. Pleasant Street, Amherst, MA. The exhibit is open to the public during the Center’s hours, Monday through Friday, 9:30 a.m. to 5 p.m.
In Elusive Prize: Wonder, Wing, & Transmutation, Graving explores themes of alchemy, science, and the human pursuit of an elusive prize in the name of immortality. Inspired by the texts and materials from the Kinney Center’s rare book collection, Graving uses iron gall inks, vellum, historically specific pigments, and paper in both sculpture and monoprints to pursue ideas of ambition taking wing in the early modern world and our own.
Graving is a sculptor and printmaker who often works on a very large scale in mediums that include bronze, neon, paper, resins, steel, and wood. She is the owner and master printmaker at Gravity Press Experimental Print Shop which holds one of the largest platen presses in the world. Her work has been exhibited in numerous public and private collections including the New Orleans Museum of Art, The Library of Congress, and The Frederick R. Weisman Collection. She has also received many prestigious awards including the Pollack-Krasner Foundation Award and the “Spark” Lifetime Achievement Award from Louisiana College of the Arts.
The Renaissance of the Earth is a publicly engaged humanities project that brings together a series of interdisciplinary research collaborations, undergraduate and graduate courses, hands-on workshops, curated exhibitions, and arts programming to consider how legacies of the early modern past inform our environmental future. The residency invites local artists to explore the ways in which their work intersects with Renaissance thought and craft to produce creations that generate new perspectives on the relationship between the early modern world and our own.
For more about the Renaissance of the Earth Project, please visit renaissanceoftheearth.com.