SUNDAY L.E.S. | Ed Blackburn "Bible Paintings"

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

The gallery is pleased to announce the first exhibition: Bible Paintings by Ed Blackburn.

Allowing for the possibility of faith while remaining leery of it, Ed Blackburn mines the Bible’s stories as a fertile and usable part of our collective psyche.

The question for Blackburn centers on the dilemma of the Bible as cultural cliché played against the Bible as searching spiritual force. He investigates that dilemma by using both of the visual languages that have expressed each side of the problem – namely, the language of cliché, which is the "popular" language of American media, and the language of spiritual urgency, which is the "high" language of modern painting from German Expressionism. In doing so, he grapples with the role of the Bible in terms that are relevant and compelling to contemporary art and culture. – Excerpted from “Both Edges At Once” by Wayne Roosa for Image Journal.

Speaking about the shift that occurred in his work during the late 1980s, Blackburn states:

I got this renewed thought about biblical stories. I thought this must be a valuable thing; they will always be valuable as art and I had a renewed interest because it seemed like a time where people had a need for some clarity – not only in the world in general but the art world in particular. The word that came to my mind for these stories is that they are something substantial.

Ed Blackburn was born in 1940 in Amarillo, Texas and received an MA in 1965 from the University of California in Berkeley, a BFA in 1962 from the University of Texas in Austin and a scholarship to study at the Brooklyn Museum of Art during 1962-63. He lives and works in Fort Worth, Texas.

His works have been featured in past exhibitions at the Houston Museum of Fine Arts, the Modern Art Museum of Fort Worth, the University of Nevada at Las Vegas, the Aspen Museum of Art, and the Dallas Museum of Art among others. His works have been discussed in Art in America, Art News, the Village Voice, Image Journal, and Texas Monthly among others.

His works are also in the collections of the Houston Museum of Fine Art, the Dallas Museum of Fine Art, the Modern Art Museum of Fort Worth, the San Antonio Museum of Art, the El Paso Museum of Art, the Tyler Museum of Art, the Longview Museum of Art, the Mint Museum of Art, the University of New Mexico at Albuquerque, the Amarillo Museum of Art, the Kemper Museum of Contemporary Art, and the Western Carolina University Museum.

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		Ed Blackburn Bible Paintings October 6 – November 12, 2006 Reception: Friday, October 6, 6-9 PM


		FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE The gallery is pleased to announce the first exhibition: Bible Paintings by Ed Blackburn. Allowing for the possibility of faith while remaining leery of it, Ed Blackburn mines the Bible’s stories as a fertile and usable part of our collective psyche. The question for Blackburn centers on the dilemma of the Bible as cultural cliché played against the Bible as searching spiritual force. He investigates that dilemma by using both of the visual languages that have expressed each side of the problem – namely, the language of cliché, which is the "popular" language of American media, and the language of spiritual urgency, which is the "high" language of modern painting from German Expressionism. In doing so, he grapples with the role of the Bible in terms that are relevant and compelling to contemporary art and culture. – Excerpted from “Both Edges At Once” by Wayne Roosa for Image Journal. Speaking about the shift that occurred in his work during the late 1980s, Blackburn states: I got this renewed thought about biblical stories. I thought this must be a valuable thing; they will always be valuable as art and I had a renewed interest because it seemed like a time where people had a need for some clarity – not only in the world in general but the art world in particular. The word that came to my mind for these stories is that they are something substantial. Ed Blackburn was born in 1940 in Amarillo, Texas and received an MA in 1965 from the University of California in Berkeley, a BFA in 1962 from the University of Texas in Austin and a scholarship to study at the Brooklyn Museum of Art during 1962-63. He lives and works in Fort Worth, Texas. His works have been featured in past exhibitions at the Houston Museum of Fine Arts, the Modern Art Museum of Fort Worth, the University of Nevada at Las Vegas, the Aspen Museum of Art, and the Dallas Museum of Art among others. His works have been discussed in Art in America, Art News, the Village Voice, Image Journal, and Texas Monthly among others. His works are also in the collections of the Houston Museum of Fine Art, the Dallas Museum of Fine Art, the Modern Art Museum of Fort Worth, the San Antonio Museum of Art, the El Paso Museum of Art, the Tyler Museum of Art, the Longview Museum of Art, the Mint Museum of Art, the University of New Mexico at Albuquerque, the Amarillo Museum of Art, the Kemper Museum of Contemporary Art, and the Western Carolina University Museum.