Wednesday, October 12, 2011

Mississippi Gulf Coast artist Lori K. Gordon is bringing an exhibition of her work to UNCW. Gordon is an internationally recognized artist known primarily for The Katrina Collection, her series of mixed media assemblages which incorporate storm debris and for Labat: A Creole Legacy which has been acquired by the Smithsonian Institution. The exhibition will be installed in the Warwick Center Lobby Oct. 18-24.

An artist's talk will be held from 4 to 5 p.m. on Oct. 18 in room 2033 of the Cultural Arts Building. Her talk is part of the ongoing fall Synergy events and is co-sponsored by the UNCW Art & Art History Department, University College, the Boseman Gallery and Student Affairs.

Gordon will teaching a workshop on collage from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. on Friday, Oct. 21 in the Warwick Center Lobby. The workshop is open to the public. The cost is $90 per person with a $15 materials fee, with a discounted student rate of $54 and a $10 supplies fee. For more information on the collage workshop, please contact the artist at lorikgordon@gmail.com or call 228.342.0877.

Gordon first garnered national attention with her 8' x 10' art quilt that portrayed the life of Celestine Labat of Bay St. Louis, Miss. who died at the age of 104. Gordon incorporated portions of Labat's oral history with the centenarian's family photographs to create a montage of Creole life in the 19th and 20th centuries. The piece was acquired by the Smithsonian Institution in 2004 as part of their permanent collection. In 2005, Gordon lost her home and studio to Hurricane Katrina. Within weeks, she was creating art from the rubble that overwhelmed the Mississippi Gulf Coast.

To date, she has created more than 1,100 works of art which incorporate debris from Hurricane Katrina. Gordon's work has been featured in media around the country and in Europe, including the New York Times, CBS, MSNBC, NPR, Svenska Dagbladet (Sweden), Travel Mail (UK), Christian Science Monitor and others. Her work has been featured in several documentaries and on Mississippi Public Broadcasting and she recently served as a panelist at the 9/11 Tenth Anniversary Summit on Resilience, sponsored in part by the Center for National Policy in Washington, D.C.

Private collectors of Gordon's work include Presidents Barack Obama and Jimmy Carter, ESPN's Jon Miller, ABC's Robin Roberts, country singer Faith Hill and CNN's Tom Foreman. Public collectors are the University of Southern Mississippi, Mississippi Humanities Council, Safeco Corporate Collection, Virginia Commonwealth University, University of Kentucky, International Museum of Muslim Cultures, Hancock County Library System and the City of Bay St. Louis.

Gordon's biographical information may be accessed online at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lori_Gordon. Her complete curriculum vitae may be found at http://thekatrinacollectionbylorikgordon.blogspot.com/.

For more information on the exhibit and gallery talk, please contact Stephanie Mancuso at 910.962.7722.