THE
COLLEGE OF NEW ROCHELLE EXPANDS ART EXHIBIT
WITH VIDEO PAINTING OF THE BLACK MADONNA
New Rochelle, NY, January 6,
2005 - Haunting, luminous, ethereal…these words describe George Peck’s
new video painting, “Black Madonna (who’s Madonna?)”, now on display in
the Mooney Center Gallery at The College of New Rochelle, from January
4-26, 2005. It is being presented in conjunction with The College of
New Rochelle’s Castle Gallery show, “The Black Madonna.”
A reception for the artist
will be held on Saturday, January 22, 2005 from 3-6 pm. The
reception is free and open to the public.
Mr. Peck writes about his
work, “In the “Black Madonna (who’s Madonna?),” layers of acrylic
paint, polymer, nylon scrim and video recall the Italian Renaissance,
20th century Surrealism, kitsch and the moving image. Here painting
becomes an animated and energized incident. All the layers of material,
and the painting’s visual language are being used to support the idea
that today’s Madonna belongs to a dignified working class. Duccio’s
Madonna and Child (in the Metropolitan Museum of Art) is a small egg
tempera painting made seven hundred years ago in Medieval Italy. This
work references the Byzantine style and material, looking back into the
past in order to see a sharpened present. While I also look back, my
departure here is the usage of video to rediscover painting anew.”
Mr. Peck, a Hungarian-born,
New York-based artist, is known for his work from traditional oil
painting to his postmodern applications. His training was done at Yale
University under Josef Albers and Hunter College as well, where we
worked with Tony Smith. Mr. Peck’s work is in the collections of
the Metropolitan Museum of Art, NY, the Brooklyn Museum of Art in NY,
Moderna Museet in Stockholm, Sweden, the Museum of Fine Arts and the
Museum of Applied Arts, both in Budapest, Hungary, among others.
In conjunction with Mr. Peck’s show, The Black
Madonna exhibit at the Castle Gallery combines both the historical
aspect of The Black Madonna with modern-day renditions from a
multicultural all female roster of artists, who were invited to create
new works based on this image. The powerful images of the Black
Madonnas in this exhibit will be juxtaposed to the traditional, tender
and helpless depiction of the Virgin Mary so commonly found in Western
Culture. The works include assemblage, video, installation, oil
paintings, ceramic reliefs, and wall drawings. This show is on display
until Sunday, February 27, 2005.
Both the Mooney Center
Gallery and the Castle Gallery are located at The College of New
Rochelle’s main campus in New Rochelle, New York. They are open
Tuesday & Wednesday, 10:00 am to 8:00 pm, Thursday & Friday,
10:00 am to 5:00 pm, Saturday & Sunday, 12 noon to 4:00 pm.
The galleries are closed on Mondays and major national holidays.
For information, tours, and directions to the galleries at CNR, please
call (914)654-5423 or log onto
www.cnr.edu/CNR/cnr-directions.html#NEWROCHELLE
<http://www.cnr.edu/CNR/cnr-directions.html#NEWROCHELLE>.
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.
The first Catholic
college for women in New York State,
The
College of New Rochelle was founded in 1904 by the Ursuline Order.
Today,
it comprises the all-women School of Arts & Sciences, and three
schools
which admit women and men: the School of New Resources (for adult
learners),
the School of Nursing and the Graduate School. The main campus of
the College is located in lower Westchester County, 16 miles north of
New York City. The College maintains six other campus locations
in New York
City. Visit the College’s website at www.cnr.edu
