2014 HERITAGE CENTER VISITING EXHIBITIONS
Purvis Young
Urban Expressionist
January 24 – March 29, 2014
Miami resident Purvis Young, 1943-2010, was an African American artist who commented on the state of his Overtown community through his artwork. Using plywood, cabinet doors, and other debris tossed out by his neighbors, he created art that speaks about the present day lives of black people. His painted depictions of funerals, uprisings, and cityscapes all cry out for a rebirth of wellness, while his painted books relay the African American story that history made invisible through neglect.
Overtown was an impoverished and segregated community during Young’s lifetime. Like several of his peers, he dropped out of school and turned to crime, serving three years at the Raiford State Prison at the age of eighteen. In prison, Young was visited by an angel with the message that incarceration was not to be the path of his life, and from that moment he turned his life around by making art, which he had loved as a boy. He made art passionately and also became a social activist, deeply affected by the Civil Rights movement of the 1960s.
His urban mural entitled Godbread Alley, which was visible from the freeway that cut through Overtown, made him a familiar name in his community and in the public art world. His work became of great interest to art scholars, collectors and community members, which led him to exhibitions in museums and galleries around the world, including the Bass Museum in Miami, the Corcoran Gallery in Washington, D.C., the High Museum in Atlanta, Georgia, and the Smithsonian American Art Museum in Washington, D.C. In 1999, the Rubell Family of Miami bought the entire contents of Mr. Young’s studio at the time, which accounted for as many as 3,000 pieces of art.
A selection of his paintings and books will be on loan from Volusia County art collector Lisa Stone. An opening night panel discussion, Exploring African American Communities through the Art of Purvis Young, will be moderated by folklorist and UCF Professor Emeritus Kristin Congdon, Ph.D. This panel will discuss the ways in which Young’s perspective of the African American community, specifically and in general, has merit. It will also address Young’s vision of making change.
The opening event begins with the panel discussion from 6:00 to 7:00 p.m. at Mt. Moriah Missionary Baptist Church, followed by a reception with live music from 7:00 to 9:00 p.m., Friday, January 24, at the Heritage Center.
Miami resident Purvis Young, 1943-2010, was an African American artist who commented on the state of his Overtown community through his artwork. Using plywood, cabinet doors, and other debris tossed out by his neighbors, he created art that speaks about the present day lives of black people. His painted depictions of funerals, uprisings, and cityscapes all cry out for a rebirth of wellness, while his painted books relay the African American story that history made invisible through neglect.
Overtown was an impoverished and segregated community during Young’s lifetime. Like several of his peers, he dropped out of school and turned to crime, serving three years at the Raiford State Prison at the age of eighteen. In prison, Young was visited by an angel with the message that incarceration was not to be the path of his life, and from that moment he turned his life around by making art, which he had loved as a boy. He made art passionately and also became a social activist, deeply affected by the Civil Rights movement of the 1960s.
His urban mural entitled Godbread Alley, which was visible from the freeway that cut through Overtown, made him a familiar name in his community and in the public art world. His work became of great interest to art scholars, collectors and community members, which led him to exhibitions in museums and galleries around the world, including the Bass Museum in Miami, the Corcoran Gallery in Washington, D.C., the High Museum in Atlanta, Georgia, and the Smithsonian American Art Museum in Washington, D.C. In 1999, the Rubell Family of Miami bought the entire contents of Mr. Young’s studio at the time, which accounted for as many as 3,000 pieces of art.
A selection of his paintings and books will be on loan from Volusia County art collector Lisa Stone. An opening night panel discussion, Exploring African American Communities through the Art of Purvis Young, will be moderated by folklorist and UCF Professor Emeritus Kristin Congdon, Ph.D. This panel will discuss the ways in which Young’s perspective of the African American community, specifically and in general, has merit. It will also address Young’s vision of making change.
The opening event begins with the panel discussion from 6:00 to 7:00 p.m. at Mt. Moriah Missionary Baptist Church, followed by a reception with live music from 7:00 to 9:00 p.m., Friday, January 24, at the Heritage Center.
FIFTH ANNUAL
Folk Art & Craft Festival
March 29, 2014
The Festival features work for sale by Florida folk 6/27/20132/25/2014and traditional craft artists, including the original Florida Highwaymen painters, and Crealdé ceramicists, as well as live folk music, local soul food, displays by vendors and a free, hands-on “Kid Folk” Storybook Workshop that combines art and poetry for ages 5 and up. (See photos below.) Saturday, 10:00 a.m. to 4:00 p.m. on March 29.
The Festival features work for sale by Florida folk 6/27/20132/25/2014and traditional craft artists, including the original Florida Highwaymen painters, and Crealdé ceramicists, as well as live folk music, local soul food, displays by vendors and a free, hands-on “Kid Folk” Storybook Workshop that combines art and poetry for ages 5 and up. (See photos below.) Saturday, 10:00 a.m. to 4:00 p.m. on March 29.
ONE PLACE
Paul Kwilecki and Four Decades of Photographs
Decatur County, Georgia
April 4 – June 29, 2014
Paul Kwilecki was born in Bainbridge, Georgia and died there in 2009. In between he raised a family, ran the family’s hardware store, and taught himself to use a camera. During his decades of working on his opus—in his home terrain, Paul used different words to describe it –“my project,” a “photographic journal” and, perhaps most often, “a document.” “None of these rather simplistic words and descriptions communicate the nuance of his work; I know of no single body of work with a reach and resonance of what Paul accomplished in Decatur County,” says Tom Rankin, curator and director of the Center for Documentary Studies (CDS) at Duke University in Durham, North Carolina. “While Paul ranks among the most important documentary photographers of the 20th century, he is also one of the least well known. In his own words, Paul Kwilecki says, “I don’t make pictures to decorate walls; I make them to shed light in dark corners.”
This exhibition of 48 framed silver prints spanning the artist’s career is on loan from the CDS. Crealdé will display the collection in two locations, at the Alice & William Jenkins Gallery at Crealdé’s main campus and at the Hannibal Square Heritage Center Visiting Exhibition Gallery in downtown Winter Park.
Opening night reception and gallery talk with Tom Rankin, Friday April 4, 2014, from 7 to 8:30 at the Jenkins Gallery followed by a blues performance and continued reception at the Hannibal Square Heritage Center from 8:30 to 10:00 p.m.
Paul Kwilecki was born in Bainbridge, Georgia and died there in 2009. In between he raised a family, ran the family’s hardware store, and taught himself to use a camera. During his decades of working on his opus—in his home terrain, Paul used different words to describe it –“my project,” a “photographic journal” and, perhaps most often, “a document.” “None of these rather simplistic words and descriptions communicate the nuance of his work; I know of no single body of work with a reach and resonance of what Paul accomplished in Decatur County,” says Tom Rankin, curator and director of the Center for Documentary Studies (CDS) at Duke University in Durham, North Carolina. “While Paul ranks among the most important documentary photographers of the 20th century, he is also one of the least well known. In his own words, Paul Kwilecki says, “I don’t make pictures to decorate walls; I make them to shed light in dark corners.”
This exhibition of 48 framed silver prints spanning the artist’s career is on loan from the CDS. Crealdé will display the collection in two locations, at the Alice & William Jenkins Gallery at Crealdé’s main campus and at the Hannibal Square Heritage Center Visiting Exhibition Gallery in downtown Winter Park.
Opening night reception and gallery talk with Tom Rankin, Friday April 4, 2014, from 7 to 8:30 at the Jenkins Gallery followed by a blues performance and continued reception at the Hannibal Square Heritage Center from 8:30 to 10:00 p.m.
BUSINESS AS COMMUNITY LIFE
Winter Park 2013
A collaboration between Crealdé School of Art
& Winter Park Historical Association.
July 18 – October 25, 2014
The purpose of this project is to portray the Winter Park Business community of 2013 for a contemporary exhibition and a valuable historic record for future generations. As a reflection of contemporary culture, a cross-section of businesses were selected for this documentary. Twelve advanced Crealdé students, under the direction of professional documentary photographers Peter Schreyer and Sherri Bunye, photographed 28 businesses, chosen based on their value as historic architecture or long-term presence in the community. The exhibition will feature both interior and exterior images, night photographs, merchandise and environmental portraits. After the closing of the exhibit, the Winter Park Historical Association will include the work as part of their permanent archive. Opening reception and gallery talk, Friday, July 18, 7 to 9 p.m.
The purpose of this project is to portray the Winter Park Business community of 2013 for a contemporary exhibition and a valuable historic record for future generations. As a reflection of contemporary culture, a cross-section of businesses were selected for this documentary. Twelve advanced Crealdé students, under the direction of professional documentary photographers Peter Schreyer and Sherri Bunye, photographed 28 businesses, chosen based on their value as historic architecture or long-term presence in the community. The exhibition will feature both interior and exterior images, night photographs, merchandise and environmental portraits. After the closing of the exhibit, the Winter Park Historical Association will include the work as part of their permanent archive. Opening reception and gallery talk, Friday, July 18, 7 to 9 p.m.
VISIONARY BILL JENKINS
Crealdé Founder, Artist & Philanthropist
November 6, 2014 – January 31, 2015
As a kickoff to Crealdé’s 40th Anniversary year, our organization remembers the vision and the artwork of our late founder William Sterling Jenkins (1910 to 1996) in a two gallery presentation. Trained as an artist in Europe and Mexico in the 1930’s, he produced a beautiful body of landscape and portrait paintings of the places he travelled to as a young man, as well as the changing cultural landscape of his native American South. After serving in active duty during World War II, he worked for the Veteran’s Hospital in Florida where he was inspired to create a rehabilitative art program for veterans. After moving to Winter Park, Florida in the late 1940’s he founded Jenkins Construction and built many of the city’s residential communities and shopping centers. In the midst of his business successes, he never lost sight of his dream to establish a community-based art school where individuals of all ages and background could come and study in a nurturing and inclusive environment with professional artists. In 1975 he fulfilled this vision and established Crealdé School of Art at its current location.
Opening reception, Friday, November 7, beginning with a panel discussion on the legacy of Crealdé’s founder, from 6:00 to 7:00 p.m. at the Jenkins Gallery followed by a continued reception with live music at the Hannibal Square Heritage Center from 8:30 to 10:00 p.m.
As a kickoff to Crealdé’s 40th Anniversary year, our organization remembers the vision and the artwork of our late founder William Sterling Jenkins (1910 to 1996) in a two gallery presentation. Trained as an artist in Europe and Mexico in the 1930’s, he produced a beautiful body of landscape and portrait paintings of the places he travelled to as a young man, as well as the changing cultural landscape of his native American South. After serving in active duty during World War II, he worked for the Veteran’s Hospital in Florida where he was inspired to create a rehabilitative art program for veterans. After moving to Winter Park, Florida in the late 1940’s he founded Jenkins Construction and built many of the city’s residential communities and shopping centers. In the midst of his business successes, he never lost sight of his dream to establish a community-based art school where individuals of all ages and background could come and study in a nurturing and inclusive environment with professional artists. In 1975 he fulfilled this vision and established Crealdé School of Art at its current location.
Opening reception, Friday, November 7, beginning with a panel discussion on the legacy of Crealdé’s founder, from 6:00 to 7:00 p.m. at the Jenkins Gallery followed by a continued reception with live music at the Hannibal Square Heritage Center from 8:30 to 10:00 p.m.
