Gallery Night @ PPL: Visual Literacy

Thursday, September 18

6:00-7:30 pm ~ Special Collections Open House
Meet Librarian Rick Ring and learn more about our fascinating collections. A variety of books, prints, and photographs will be featured and discussed each month.

6:30-7:30 pm Local Artist Presentation:
Rebecca Macri - "Process & Serendipity"

Light refreshments will be served.

Coming up...

October 16: Christine Serchia

Christine Serchia will present her mixed media work. She is an installation artist who composes with light, photography, vellum, found objects, and an occasional kinetic mechanism to construct detailed collages and to articulate visual poetry. Her assemblages are sensitive vignettes of subconscious personal discoveries, experiences new and old, fictional and true alike. To view more of her work visit: www.christineserchia.com

About Christine
After receiving her BFA in 2005 from the School of Art & Design at Alfred University in NY where she attended as a Presidential Scholar, Christine received an international grant which enabled her to live and work in Florance, Italy. Her time in Tuscany, in the context of a new language and culture, evoked her recent photographic and assemblage series entitled, “Da Portar Via,” tangible moments spliced from her travels. She has shown her work at Studio 61 in Florence, at Visual AIDS: Postcards from the Edge benefits at the Robert Miller Gallery and Sikkemma, Jenkins, & Co. in New York, at the Museum of Luminous Phenomena in Alfred, NY, at the University of Wisconsin, Madison, and more recently at the spring edition of Providence Art Windows.

November 20 : Neal Drobnis
Neal will discuss and present his work in glass. His pieces draw from a multitude of sources, including the visual language of architecture, the human figure, and cultural iconography. Often inspired by museums of ancient artifacts as well as books, magazines, and travel experiences, Neal will discuss his goal to create ultra modern artifacts, individual objects that enhance the living environment, questioning preconceived notions of material and time.

About Neal
Neal is drawn to the glass medium because its fluidity makes it an expressionist art form, its transparency brings the colors to life, and the contrasts between its textures enhances the perception of rough and smooth surfaces. In his own words, “My sculpture combines the processes of glassblowing and casting. In this exacting and action-packed physical drama, carved and assembled templates are pressed into the sand to create a mold, released and then manipulated. I use the vessel form to establish a contrast between interior and exterior surfaces: the former is a showcase for the depth and intricacies of the casting, while the latter offers a transition from the earthy texture of the sand to the polished lip of the piece.” Neal received his MFA from Rhode Island School of Design and his BFA from Massachusetts College of Art. His work is present in numerous public and private collections and is shown in galleries worldwide. For more about Neal, visit: http://www.nealdrobnis.com/

December 18: Visual Literacy continues – Gallery Night ends: Elizabeth Turbergen
Elizabeth Tubergen will be presenting the Providence Public Library with a handmade blank book as a part of her ongoing project, Public Book Space. The book will become a part of the library's collection: catalogued, shelved, and available for check-out, the book includes a foreword that encourages patrons to fill its pages with content of their choice. In addition to presenting Public Book Space, Tubergen will also be screening and discussing her new short video, Strings too Short to Use. For more about her work, visit: http://elizabethtubergen.blogspot.com/

About Elizabeth
Born at a nuclear submarine base in Groton, Connecticut with a head full of fuzzy red hair, Elizabeth Tubergen has spent most of her life with her two parents, two brothers, and two cats. More recently, her artistic endeavors explore the space between nostalgia and cynicism. Tubergen’s methodology incorporates fearless belief powered by human muscle, play, vulnerability, and a monumentality of patient labor. She is interested in hope, loss, leftovers, the unsaid, the genuine, the pathetic, and the reliable. Tubergen creates objects, videos and actions that incite curiosity and suggest a reconsideration of space and locational identity. Her work takes place in public places, and has been shown at various locations, including the Urban Institute for Contemporary Arts in Michigan, the Visual Arts Alliance in Texas, and Solar One in New York city. Tubergen is represented by the LaFontsee’s Underground Studio in Grand Rapids, Michigan, and holds a BA from Covenant College in Lookout Mountain, Georgia. She has been awarded fellowships at the Ox-Bow School of Art and the MacDowell Colony. Tubergen lives and works in Queens, New York.

In our third floor marble staircase area, the Library will feature representative items drawn from its circulating and non-circulating architecture collections.

Providence Public Library is committed to providing quality programming on a variety of educational topics. The views and opinions expressed therein are those of the individual presenters and do not necessarily represent the views and opinions of the Library. We welcome community members to work with us to provide free, thought-provoking events of interest.