FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
CONTACT:
Rose Mary Gorman: (615) 744-3332, ”
Ellen Jones Pryor: (615) 243-1311, ”, ”
BOB TROTMAN: MODEL CITIZENS OPENS AT FRIST CENTER NOV. 10, 2006
North Carolina Artist Shows Figurative Sculptures
in Gordon Contemporary Artists Project Gallery
NASHVILLE, TENN.—(Oct.17, 2006)—Bob Trotman: Model Citizens will open at
the Frist Center for the Visual Arts Friday, Nov. 10, 2006 in the Gordon Contemporary Artists Project Gallery. The exhibition features seven carved and painted wood sculptures made by Trotman between 2001 and 2005. The exhibition continues through Feb. 11, 2007.
The sculptures in Model Citizens depict people with the clothes and hairstyles of the 1950s, whose dramatic poses convey a sense of distress at their inability to understand or control the forces that shape their lives. Seemingly humorous tributes to the postwar generation of which Trotman’s parents were a part, the works also imply that the model citizen of yesterday—and today—passively accepts his or her lack of control in exchange for the comfort that comes from not questioning society’s assumptions.
Trotman considers wood to be a perfect medium for conveying his humanistic concerns. He began working with wood as a furniture craftsman in 1974, often incorporating anthropomorphic imagery so that his works were both functional craft and sculpture. Eventually, Trotman realized that his real interest was in creating a “poetic expression of what it feels to be alive…in the world.” Thus, in 1997, Trotman focused completely on art making, and has since created a compelling array of characters, embodying the pathos, self-delusion, and desperate heroism of everyday life.
“As a figurative sculptor my concern is the exploration, interpretation, and representation of the human body,” says Bob Trotman in his artist’s statement. “My subjects are caught in dilemmas they can neither escape nor understand, and wood, through its organic warmth, its quirks and flaws, gives their quandaries an immediacy they might not otherwise have.”
Writer Dinah Ryan, in a review for Sculpture magazine (December 2002), said that Trotman’s “solitary wooden figures invite the reflection that the juncture between accident and intention may be the fulcrum of human experience.”
Born in Winston-Salem, NC, Trotman received a B.A. in philosophy from Washington and Lee University, and for 30 years has maintained a studio in the foothills of western North Carolina. Self-taught in art, he has received two fellowships from the National Endowment for the Arts, three fellowships from the North Carolina Arts Council, and has had four solo gallery shows in New York City. His work is in the permanent collections of the Renwick Gallery, Smithsonian Institution; the Virginia Museum of Fine Arts; the North Carolina Museum of Art; the Weatherspoon Museum of Art; the Mint Museum of Art; the Museum of Art of the Rhode Island School of Design; and the Museum of Art and Design in New York, among others.
PROGRAMS
• ARTini: Friday, Dec. 15, 2006 at 7:00 p.m., Mark Scala, Frist Center Chief Curator, will lead an ARTini talk about one or two pieces of art from Model Citizens. Free with purchase of gallery admission.
• Artist’s Perspective: Thursday, Jan. 11, 2007 at 6:30 p.m., artist Bob Trotman will discuss his work featured in Model Citizens. The lecture will be in the Frist Center auditorium and is free.
SPONSOR
Bob Trotman: Model Citizens is sponsored by the 2006 Gordon Contemporary Artists Project Gallery Exhibition Sponsor: Welling LaGrone and Morgan Keegan.
ALSO ON VIEW AT THE FRIST CENTER
• Extra-Ordinary: The Everyday Object in American Art
Nov. 10, 2006 to Feb. 11, 2007
Ingram Gallery
2006 Platinum Sponsor: HCA and the TriStar Family of Hospitals;
2006 Gold Sponsor: First Tennessee; and 2006 Silver Sponsor: BellSouth
Organized by the Whitney Museum of American Art, New York.
• Transformations
Nov. 10, 2006 to Feb. 11, 2007
Education Gallery
Presenting Sponsor: CBRL Group Foundation, Cracker Barrel Old Country Store, and Logan’s Roadhouse
• Young Tennessee Artists: 2006 Statewide Advanced Placement Studio Art
Oct. 27, 2006 to Jan. 7, 2007
Conte Community Arts Gallery
Presenting Sponsor: Publix Super Markets Charities, Inc.
This exhibition was funded in part by the Metropolitan Nashville Arts Commission and the Tennessee Arts Commission.
• Bedazzled: 5,000 Years of Jewelry from the Walters Art Museum
Sept. 15, 2006 to Jan. 14, 2007
Upper-Level Galleries
Presenting Sponsor: The Tiffany & Co. Foundation
Organized by the Walters Art Museum.
About the Frist Center
The Frist Center for the Visual Arts, located at 919 Broadway in downtown Nashville, Tenn., is an art exhibition center dedicated to presenting the finest visual art from local, regional, U.S. and international sources in a program of changing exhibitions. The Frist Center’s Martin ArtQuest Gallery features over 30 interactive stations relating to Frist Center exhibitions. Gallery admission to the Frist Center is free for visitors 18 and under and to Frist Center members. Frist Center admission is $8.50 for adults, $7.50 for seniors and military, and $6.50 for college students with ID. Discounts are offered for groups of 10 or more with advance reservation by calling (615) 744-3246. The Frist Center is open seven days a week: Mondays through Wednesdays and Saturdays, 10:00 a.m. to 5:30 p.m.; Thursdays and Fridays, 10:00 a.m. to 9:00 p.m.; and Sundays, 1:00 p.m. to 5:30 p.m., with the Café opening at noon. Additional information is available by calling (615) 244-3340 or by visiting our Web site at http://www.fristcenter.org.
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