Marshall University Art Professor Ian Hagarty attended public screenings and the award ceremony for the European Cultural Centre’s Personal Structures —Reflections exhibition, held in conjunction with the Venice Biennale 2022. A work by Hagarty and Marshall Photography Associate Professor Danny Kaufmann, Riverine, was featured.
“This is the biggest exhibition opportunity of our careers,” said Hagarty, who has taught painting, drawing and other courses. “We wanted to embrace this opportunity to challenge ourselves to do something different and meaningful. Knowing that there was going to be this massive international audience, we wanted to showcase where we live in this significant moment and saw it as a unique opportunity to promote West Virginia in a positive way.”
The Venice Biennale is a premier international art exhibition and the world’s oldest biennial exhibition. According to the European Cultural Centre, it attracts 500,000 visitors from April through November, so the opportunity to exhibit during the Venice Biennale brings international attention to the New River Gorge National Park and West Virginia. Riverine celebrates the park and reflects its rich anthropological, cultural and geological chronology.
“We were trying to represent what we were learning about the park through our artistic practice and sensibilities,” Hagarty said. “We also wanted the piece to be something that neither Danny nor I have ever done before.”
The two professors received the Marshall University Distinguished Artists and Scholars group award for Riverine in 2022. To produce and exhibit Riverine, Hagarty and Kaufmann received major support from the Chiericozzi family, Marshall’s College of Arts and Media, the Marshall University Foundation and the Marshall University Research Corporation (MURC). Both professors plan to use this experience to develop new curricula within the School of Art and Design.
A video tour of the exhibit can be seen here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d477qrwczR0.
For more information about Marshall University’s School of Art and Design, visit www.marshall.edu/art.