MAC will unveil the 2017 Senior Showcase on July 7, sharing the work of Morgantown and North Central West Virginia’s Seniors. The exhibition, a collaboration between MAC and Community Living Initiatives Corporation (CLIC), will include pieces by a variety of artists over 50. The exhibition includes previous MAC exhibitors, such as Thompson Holmes, who contributed this year’s promotional piece.

MAC states “older adults play an important role in our community, including their ability to bring beauty, culture and meaning to our lives through their work as artists” and welcomes the community to enjoy, recognize, and celebrate the contributions of these artists. The public opening reception for the 2017 Senior Showcase will commence on July 7 at 6 pm, with a Ribbon Awards ceremony taking place at 7 pm.

MAC is located at 107 High Street, Morgantown, WV.  Inquiries should be directed to info@monartscenter.com or 304-292-3325.

Monongalia Arts Center (MAC) welcomes photographer Thompson Holmes to the Benedum Gallery for the month of May. His new exhibition is titled Americana. Holmes has created an exhibition that captures the classic American imagery of the Pacific Nortwest and Appalachia in a fresh and nuanced style. The exhibition consists of photographs, mostly monochrome and low-saturation images, that create a modern and minimalist approach to two of America’s most romaniticized regions.

This exhibition will remain on display from May 5 through June 3, 2017, in MAC’s first-floor Benedum Gallery. All are welcome to join MAC for a  Public Opening Reception on May 5, which will commence from 6 to 8 pm. A benefit concert, provided by the High Street Jazz Band, will immediately follow at 8 pm, bringing the sounds of New Orleans to the Tanner Theatre.

MAC is located at 107 High Street, Morgantown, WV.  Inquiries should be directed to info@monartscenter.com or 304-292-3325.

Combatting Environmental Destruction With Art

Morgantown’s home for the arts and culture, Monongalia Arts Center (MAC), is once again using art to champion justice. MAC is teaming up with local artist Betsy jaeger, who created an exhibition titled Inside Looking Out to share both the nostalgic beauty that once existed and the current state of ruin in her community in Western Monongalia County.

With the advent of modern mining equipment in the mid-2000s, surface coal mining in western Monongalia County quickly grew in scale, and Jaeger perceived a seismic shift in her community. She refused to sell her rural home and mineral rights to a coal company, even though some of her neighbors had begun, one by one, to agree to sell their mineral rights. According to Jaeger, some also sold their entire properties.

“We watched what had been a charming farm community become an industrial wasteland in just two years,” she says. “There was not enough bond money to pay for adequate reclamation.”

In 2012, strip mining began directly in front of her home, adjacent to her property line. Jaeger tracked more than 200 blasts, which rattled the foundation of her home, and she monitored the water quality in her local stream, finding high levels of heavy metals near mining outfalls.

This exhibition recreates the views outside of her 12 windows, past and present, using mixed-media elements such as sculpture, photographs and paintings to highlight the drastic changes caused by strip mining and fracking. The artwork in this exhibition is meant to be both beautiful and eye-opening, contrasting the natural beauty of rural West Virginia with some of the worst aspects of rapid industrialization and waste. The exhibition was featured prominently in The Appalachian Voice, and the article is available at http://appvoices.org/2017/02/10/using-art-to-combat-environmental-destruction/

MAC invites all to attend the opening reception with no admission on March 3, starting at 6 pm. Two galleries will open simultaneously, including the gender-bending and thought-provoking Rebel Rebel, upstairs in the Davis Gallery; and Inside Looking Out, downstairs in the Benedum Gallery. MAC is located at 107 High Street, Morgantown, WV.  Inquiries should be directed to info@monartscenter.com or 304-292-3325.

Image: Power Line by Betsy Jaeger