In This Issue…
• Jenne Glover – “Homage to Bearden” — November 11 to December 22, 2012 at the Corridor Gallery, 334 Grand Avenue, Brooklyn, New York. Mark Your Calendars!!! Opening Reception Sunday, November 11 from 4 to 6 p.m.
• Editor’s Perspective: War Is Not Our Friend
• Sam Vernon: Visual Artist-Program Administrator, Art in Public Places, Prince George’s County Government
[pro-player width=’530′ height=’353′ type=’video’]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dbdGod0t1VU[/pro-player]Family Exodus 2 New York City is one of three pieces selected for “Homage to Bearden.”
Jenne Glover, Family Exodus 2 New York City
mixed media collage, 24″x18″
Editor’s Perspective: War Is Not Our Friend
Enough is enough. War sucks anyway you look at it.
I have two sons in the military, one is serving in the Army and one in the Air Force, and I along with countless other people can’t wait for the conflict to end.
After ten years of war, it’s time for our leadership to give peace a chance.
If only we could be as wise as an ant and live to work and build our communities together.
If only we could be as committed as a goose is dedicated to guiding and supporting the flock.
If only we could stay as busy as bees to sustain our communities.
If only we could love and respect each other.
Peace!
Sam Vernon: Visual Artist-Program Administrator, Prince George’s County Government
Sam Vernon is Program Administrator of Art in Public Places in Prince George’s County Government. This past February a colleague gave Sam my name and number to discuss having my art work on exhibit at the County Administration Building.
Although at the time, I was somewhat ambivalent because I was busy preparing for another exhibition, I am so happy I did accept the invitation because working with her was a treat. She picked up my art work, made sure the display looked great, and when the exhibit closed she promptly returned my work to me. Best of all, Sam is now a friend and patron. She’s refreshing to talk to because her artistic vocabulary, exuberance, and savvy elevate the conversation.
As program administrator, she is responsible for building an exhibition program and with a panel of distinguished colleagues they commission artists to create public art work for newly renovated or brand new County properties. In 1988, legislation was passed allocating 1% of construction cost for civic buildings to public art; and since then over 24 commissioned pieces have been completed.
Sam Vernon, “ghost rainbow”
pen and ink, Xeroxed, 11”x8.5”
Sam loves what she is doing because she gets to travel around the county meeting artists and art enthusiasts. Although she was raised in Prince George’s County, and attended Suitland High School’s visual arts program; she had no idea how strong the artists’ community is or the vastness of the county.
A multitalented young woman, Sam is a 2009 graduate of The Cooper Union for the Advancement of Science and Art, a private college located in New York City’s East Village. She says her breakthrough moment as an artist came in 2009 when she mounted her thesis exhibit, an installation of her drawings covering 20,000 square feet of the 6th floor lobby of The Cooper Union. Working non-stop it took four days to build the installation from the floor to the 20 foot high ceiling. Once completed, the room was black and white with red lighting shining down on the art work. She says people were amazed at how the space had been transformed.
Sam Vernon, “in red (detail II)”
pen and ink, Xeroxed, red
After graduation, she stayed in New York to continue the momentum that she had established showing her art in galleries and working in Brooklyn for a multidisciplinary non-profit arts organization and then for a contemporary art gallery in Brooklyn Heights. In 2010-2011, she was an A.I.R. Emerging Artist Fellow and a recipient of the A.I.R. Emma Bee Bernstein Fellowship. As a Fellow she was given her first solo show “Think On It—Then Lay It Down For Good.”
Sam Vernon, “Think On It – Then Lay It Down For Good”
pen and ink, Xeroxed, collaged
Sam describes her art practice as interdisciplinary, that everything she does comes from drawing and moves into photography, installations, and light. Creating installations came about through experimentation and personal preference. She doesn’t like feeling boxed in, she wants to do big imagery, loves multiplicity, and being able to continue developing an image.
Both photography and printmaking lend themselves to that, but financially she wasn’t in a position to continue doing lithography because it’s an expensive practice. One day she tried Xeroxing one of her drawings and the black ink against the white paper was exactly what she was looking for. From there she started making huge images out of her Xeroxed drawings and then began hanging them from the walls because of a dream she had about walking through a cave.
Sam Vernon, “we have never been modern (detail V)”
pen and ink, acrylic on canvas
As her imaginative vernacular evolves, she describes her work as a strain of Afrofuturism. “Afrofuturism plays tricks with history, wrapping street culture with science fiction to advance new and alternative views of the world.” Denise Markonish, art:21 blog,June 19, 2012.
Sam Vernon, “Don’t Worry What Happens Happens Mostly Without You”
digital photo
photograph by Kitija Dambite
Although she revisits and enhances her drawings, she knows she’s done when the image is very dense and is communicating what she sought to build. A lot of her drawings are figurative, but she’s also making abstract patterns, and her newer line work incorporates nature.
Continuously exploring, Sam’s been staging her installations in the natural landscapes that abound in Prince George’s County; she’s also incorporating fabric into her art work, and getting her line work printed onto fabric.
Sam Vernon, “prophet”
digital print
Sam’s line work will be on exhibit September 19 – October 27, 2012 at the University of Tennessee in “Pencil Pushed,” curated by Michael Creighton. It’s a group show that examines how artists are expanding the formal notion of drawing.
Sam Vernon, “peek-a-boo”
pen & ink, Xeroxed, 11”x8.5”
Sam created “How Ghost Sleep,” a site-specific installation for the group show “In the Realm of Folklore.” The exhibition is at the Emery Community Art Center, University of Maine in Farmington thru November 16, 2012; and features 6 other women artists. They are exploring what it means to be American and the different mythologies around their American ideology.
Sam Vernon with “How Ghost Sleep” in Farmington, Maine
Next year, she will be exhibiting in Los Angeles at the Reginald Ingraham Gallery. They are still working out the details, but she’s really excited because she’s never shown her work on the west coast.
Since she moved back to the area, Sam feels she’s in a good place and surrounded by people who want her to do well, and she’s encouraged by that. You can reach her at 301-883-6201 or at SVernon@co.pg.md.us. See more of her art work at http://www.samvernon.com/.
