The Death of Painting Is Dead

Hite Galleries - Schneider Hall

The Death of Painting Is Dead

Denise Burge, Sean Garrison, Darren Haper, Jacob Heustis, Steven L. Jones, Thea Lura (in collaboration with J. Heustis), Mark Masyga, Kim Piotrowski, Letitia Quesenberry, Carole Silverstein & Joe Vajarsky

Curated by Bruce Linn

January 14 – February 14, 2010

Reception: Thursday, January 14, 5:30 – 7:30 p.m.

As legend has it, the 19th-century French History painter Paul Delaroche declared, “From today, painting is dead,” when he encountered a daguerreotype and saw the challenge photography posed to the role of the painter. 

Today, almost all of us now face a similar crisis, where strict adherence to our training and our assumptions about our professions place us at risk of becoming the blacksmiths or buggy salesmen of our times.

This exhibition features eleven contemporary painters from around the United States. Their work demonstrates that painting did not die, only the limited assumptions of what a painting was, or could be, and what the artist’s role is, or could be.

For the rest of us, this might be an instructive lesson, a reassurance that self-knowledge and openness may be the best guarantors of a rewarding life: as the old world dissolves, we are free to make a new one better suited to our values and aspirations.  After all, what is the alternative, death?

The Hite Galleries in Schneider Hall are located near the main entrance on the west side of Schneider Hall.

Schneider Hall is on the UofL's Belknap Campus, the main campus for the University. (Map of Hite locations.)

Gallery Hours:  (Fall 2009) Mon., Tue., Wed., Fri., 9 a.m. – 4:30 p.m.; Thu., 9 a.m. – 8 p.m.; Sat., 10 a.m. – 2 p.m.; Sun., 1 - 5 p.m.

Group Tours: school & other group tours should call John Begley @ 502.852-4483 to make arrangements.