New exhibit, lecture series starts Tuesday at UTC

By Susan Pierce

Friday, January 1, 1904

photo "Color Vulture" by artist Matthew Deleget
photo Matthew Deleget 's "Shuffle: for Celia Cruz" is an acrylic and fluorescent acrylic on medium-density fiberboard.

Matthew Deleget's public eventsNote: Admission is free. For more information, visit www.cressgallery.org.Tuesday: Lecture, 5:30 p.m., UTC Fine Arts Center, Room 356, 752 Vine St., reception follows in Fine Arts Center lobby.Wednesday: Process and Materials Presentation, for anyone interested in how an artist develops a piece from idea to physical form, 11 a.m., UTC Fine Arts Center, Room 356.Thursday: Professionalism Panel, 1:40 p.m., UTC Fine Arts Center, Cress Gallery. Ruth Grover will moderate conversation with Deleget, accepting questions from audience.

Two- and three-dimensional work created by Matthew Deleget specifically for Cress Gallery at the University of Tennessee at Chattanooga will be displayed in an exhibition opening Tuesday for two months.

Deleget's work is featured in conjunction with his appearance on campus this week as part of the Diane Marek Visiting Artist Series.

"He really fits the mission of the Department of Art, the gallery and the Diane Marek Visiting Artist Series," said Ruth Grover of Deleget's selection for the series. Grover is director/curator of Cress Gallery at UTC.

"He plays a wide variety of roles as an artist. He curates exhibitions, is an adviser to nonprofit arts agencies and groups, and is very active in the arts scene. Not only is he a producing artist, he has many experiences to share with our students," she said.

The visiting artist series was begun by Diane Marek in 2006 with a goal of bringing nationally known visual artists to interact with local students and with the community. Although she has since passed away, her series continues to inspire and educate UTC collegians.

Deleget is co-founder of Minus Space gallery in Brooklyn, N.Y. Known for "reductive abstraction," his work is not bound by limits of pop art, op art or minimalism, but "builds upon the histories of those movements," according to a UTC news release.

He writes and lectures on contemporary abstraction. His work is represented by Alejandra von Hartz Gallery in Miami and Gallery Sonja Roesch in Houston.

"Pictures at an Exhibition," the show he is presenting in Cress Gallery, is inspired by the Modest Mussorgsky composition of the same name. Deleget shares a connection with the orchestral work in that his art was inspired by the late abstract painter Josef Albers. Albers designed the 1961 sleeve cover for a vinyl recording of Mussorgsky's "Pictures." When Deleget organized and curated an exhibition of Albers' album designs, that cover was among those shown.

Grover said Deleget's "Pictures at an Exhibition" will include seven works in the main gallery as well as several dozen drawings in Gallery Two.

"Pictures at an Exhibition" opens Tuesday and closes Dec. 7. The Cress Gallery is in the UTC Fine Arts Center. Hours are 9:30 a.m.-7:30 p.m. Monday-Friday, 1-4 p.m. Saturday and Sunday. Admission is free.