Faculty on Display

This fall, an exhibition of artworks by BMCC art faculty members opened in the Shirley Fiterman Art Center, located on the ground level of the college’s Miles and Shirley Fiterman Hall.

Participating faculty members are Simon Carr, Betty Copeland, Pat Genova, Xico Greenwald, Sarah Haviland, Ann Hjelle, Thaddeus Radell, Jessica Ramirez, Jerrold Schoenblum, Anthony Sorce and A.C. Towery. Their eclectic artwork was on display during the college’s acclaimed Steinway Soiree benefit, where funds were raised for scholarships and to acquire a Steinway piano for students and faculty.

In celebration of the exhibit, an opening reception was held September 28, 2013 in the Shirley Fiterman Art Gallery and featured a concert by BMCC’s Fiterman Trio: Professors Maureen Keenan on flute; Robert Reed, on cello, and Howard Meltzer, on piano.

The artists speak

Peter (Xico) Greenwald, a professor in the Music and Art department, curated the exhibit. “What I really want people to take away from it is that we’re a serious faculty; working artists in New York who are committed to helping students reach their goals in terms of expressing themselves through art,” he says.

Professor Simon Carr agrees.

“I have always enjoyed our talented, enthusiastic students, even when we were working in our former studios on the main campus,” he says. “It’s good for students to see the faculty work, it ‘calls our bluff’. Art teachers often talk about drawing, painting, photography or sculpture, now we have to show what we, the faculty, can do.”

Carr shares the story behind his featured works.

“The paintings I have in this show are based on drawings done on the subway, and in dog parks in Manhattan. I work the paintings for a long time, changing them, sometimes dramatically, until I think they at least start to feel like the scenes I experienced, and continue to experience.”

Assistant Professor Jessica Ramirez is honored to share her work in the exhibit.

“I referenced landscapes and earth forms with this series,” she explains. “I looked at the ideas of permanence and stillness with the intention to manipulate forms and then freeze them in time.  I enjoyed creating these forms, mainly because I am a process-oriented artist; I enjoy the act of creating and the techniques used during this process.”

Proferssor Betty Copeland explains that her paintings, Domino Series I “are concerned with ideas related to play and possibilities, boundaries and relationships, separation and interaction, inner and outer, clarity and relativity, permanence and change.”

According to Copeland, “this series consists of six paintings of monochromatic colors, three paintings of complementary color pairs, three paintings of primary colors used in pairs, and nine paintings of analogous color pairs geometric shapes define them.”

“The perception of color and figure-ground relationships changes due to the placement and interaction of color and shape. This arrangement of the paintings was suggested by their specific location in the Shirley Fiterman Art Center,” Copeland adds.

Professor Elizabeth Towery, who talks about her works on display, says, “I am a photographer by training, but consider myself an artist who uses photography. My undergraduate degree is in both photography and painting. These two disciplines are united by my eye for color. It has always interested and inspired me and my work.”

I am photographing in the landscape with an eye to color, light, time of day, and weather conditions in ways that emulate the work of Photographers Joel Meyerowitz, William Christenberry, and Stephen Shore. These photographers were making work in color at a time when serious fine art photographers only worked in black and white. It was their color photographs of landscapes which paved the way for color photography to be viewed seriously by the art world,” she says.

These images were taken in Hauge, NY which is a blip of a town near the northern end of Lake George. Because you are up in the mountains, the sky and clouds feel very close to you. It is a magical place, but especially when the weather is dramatic. In looking at the scene, I was trying to capture that drama – the clouds and the vista. At the same time, it is a very quiet, peaceful place – quite different from the busy, intense, stimulating world of New York City.”

Stopping by

The faculty artwork will be on display until October 26^th.

Recent graduate Allon Morgan works as a gallery assistant. “This new gallery makes me a proud BMCC alum. It’s wonderful to be part of this new gallery space, as an employee, and shows students that we are so much more than ‘just’ a community college. We’re artists, and have a vast, impressive space to showcase community talent.”

On the gallery itself, Greenwald adds: “I like the way the space relates to the street in a very busy part of town. The arts are a huge part of the New York economy. It makes sense for BMCC to have a serious exhibition space.”

Says Carr: “We have excellent studios in Fiterman Hall on the 11^th floor, along with our terrific gallery space. I’m proud to show my work with my colleagues, and hope as many students as possible stop by and visit the art classrooms and the exhibit.”

The Music and Art Department at BMCC runs 200 classes a semester in music performance, music history and theory, studio art, digital design and art history, providing students with opportunities to explore different visual media and musical outlets. Presenting students with a variety of classes in various subjects, from survey courses to specialized instruction, the BMCC faculty supports students’ educational and professional goals in the creative arts.