Faith Ringgold exhibit comes to ASU’s
Catherine J. Smith Gallery
Appalachian State University’s Catherine J. Smith
Gallery will present a lecture by renowned artist and author Faith
Ringgold.
Portrait of Faith Ringgold
by Grace Matthews |
Ringgold will address campus and community members on Wednesday,
Nov. 19 at 7 p.m. in the Blue Ridge Ballroom located in Plemmons
Student Union on the Appalachian State University campus. The
lecture, Faith Ringgold: More Than 50 Years, is free and open
to the public.
Faith Ringgold: More Than 50 Years surveys the artist’s life
and work from over five decades. Ringgold’s inspiring, humorous
and always very human stories showcase her life and work as an
artist, activist, author, teacher and parent. In her talk, Ringgold
reflects on the Civil Rights Movement and shares images from her
numerous books and more than 100 paintings, including: The Woman
on a Bridge series, The French Collection, The American Collection
and The Coming to Jones Road series.
Ringgold’s work invokes a dialogue about racial histories
and representations. She employs an array of mediums to comment
on her perspective as a woman and an African American artist working
at a time of social instability and widespread change. Her quilts
are inspired by past African-American experiences and yet still
touch on the racial dialogue occurring in the present moment.
About the Artist
Ringgold was born in 1930 in Harlem, New York City. She
began her artistic career more than 50 years ago as a painter.
Today, she is best known for her painted story quilts, which
combine painting, quilted fabric and storytelling. At a young
age, she learned the art of quilt making and sewing from her
mother and her great-great grandmother, which later influenced
her work with quilts and fabrics. Ringgold’s training is
a combination of life lessons, family tradition and formal education.
Her academic education includes both bachelors and masters degrees
in art from The City College of New York.
Ringgold is professor emeritus at the University of California,
San Diego where she taught art from 1987 until 2002. Previously,
she taught in the New York public school system for 18 years.
Ringgold is the recipient of more than 75 awards including 18
Honorary Doctor of Fine Arts degrees. She has received numerous
fellowships and grants from the National Endowment For the Arts;
The La Napoule Foundation Award; The John Simon Guggenheim Memorial
Foundation Fellowship; The New York Foundation For the Arts
Award; and The American Association of University Women.
Ringgold’s art has been widely exhibited in museums and
galleries throughout the world. Her art is included in many
private and public art collections, including The Metropolitan
Museum of Art, The National Museum of American Art, The Museum
of Modern Art, Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, Chase Manhattan
Bank Collection, The Baltimore Museum, Williams College Museum
of Art, The High Museum of Fine Art, Newark Museum, Phillip
Morris Collection, St. Louis Art Museum and The Spencer Museum.
Ringgold’s public commissions include Flying Home: Harlem
Heroes and Heroines, two 25-foot mosaic murals installed on
the uptown and downtown platforms of the 125th street Independent
Rapid Transit Subway station in New York City in 1996.
Ringgold has also illustrated and written numerous children’s
books that are distributed worldwide. Her first published book,
the award-winning Tar Beach, was released by Random House in
1991 and has won more than 30 awards, including a Caldecott
Medal for the most distinguished American picture book for children
in 1991, as well as the Coretta Scott King Award for the Best
Illustrated Children’s Book of 1991. The book, Tar Beach,
is based on the story quilt Tar Beach, from Ringgold’s
The Woman on a Bridge series. The story quilt is in the permanent
collection of the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum in New York City.
Ringgold currently lives and works in Englewood, N.J.
The Catherine J. Smith Gallery at Appalachian State University
presents Faith Ringgold: More Than 50 Years in partnership with
the Asheville Art Museum. Additional support for the event is
provided by the Office of Multicultural Student Development.
Parking is available in the College Street parking deck. Additional
parking is located in the Rivers Street parking deck and in
the lot behind the Plemmons Student Union on Howard Street.
For more information about the Catherine J. Smith Gallery or
Plemmons Student Union, visit www.art.appstate.edu/cjs/ or http://studentunion.appstate.edu/.
The Catherine J. Smith Gallery is located at 733 Rivers St.
in Farthing Auditorium on the ASU campus in Boone. Admission
is free. Hours are Monday through Friday from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m.
For more information, visit www.art.appstate.edu/cjs or call
(828) 262-7338.
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