Art Exhibitions – Mattie Kelly Arts Center Galleries

McIlroy Gallery - Amy Vigilante, Crazy Eights; Holzhauer Gallery - Bette Kauffman, Waterline Gallery hours: 9:00 am to 4:00 pm Monday to Thursday; 1:00 pm to 4:00 pm Sundays and 6:00 to 7:30p.m. prior to performances in the mainstage theater. Mattie Kelly Fine & Performing Arts Center Galleries at Northwest Florida State College, Niceville. Free and open to the Public. Opening reception:Friday, September 3 at 5:00 p.m. Amy Vigilante, a fiber artist and director of galleries at the University of Florida, will present a new portfolio of works called “Crazy Eights”, quilts created offound materials including swimsuits and Marimekko fabrics (among other fiber materials) in the Mattie Kelly Arts Center McIlroy Gallery. These large scale quilts are bright, abstract compositions. The works are made on themes both personal and universal, and in one in particular celebrates/memorializes hurricanes that have wrought havoc in Florida. Showing concurrently in the Holzhauer Gallery –is a Bette Kauffman exhibition, “Waterline”, an installation that features photos taken throughoutLouisiana after Hurricane Katrina’s floodwaters receded. Kauffman is a professor of communicationsat University of Louisiana in Monroe. NWFSC will also be the debut venue for Karen Reese Tunnell’snew suite, Oil on Water, which will hang in the Mattie Kelly Arts Center front hall. “Oil on Water” is a series of monotypes created since the Deepwater Horizon oil spill by hydroprinting on cotton,producing a marbled effect that resembles the three-dimensional surface of a body of water. Tunnell then draws on the fabric and finishes the works with quilting or other sewing techniques. These beautiful textile works draw attention to the wildlife threatened by the oil spill; gulf fish specieslike the black drum or the rare pancake batfish, as well as birds (northern gannet or common tern)and other marine animals are featured in these technically superb pieces. Tunnell has worked as anartist for over 40 years and has exhibited her works across the US and internationally. Her textilearts reside in many public and corporate collections. She maintains studios in Atlanta and Lake Santeetlah, NC, and teaches quilting at the acclaimed John C. Campbell Folk School in Brasstown, NC.