Century of visual arts at USM

This semester marks the 100th anniversary of the first course in visual arts taught at the University of Southern Mississippi, and to celebrate the Museum of Art has opened an exhibition titled “Century of Drawing.”

The opening reception was held Sunday, and the gallery will remain open through Nov. 7. Hours of operation are 10 a.m. until 5 p.m. Tuesday through Saturday.

Century of Drawing is an exhibition that showcases drawings by alumni who have studied drawing and painting at USM over the years. The featured drawings are dated from early 1940s to the early 2000s. 

“The show features over eighty drawings and includes a wonderful variety of drawing styles, including landscape, still-life, figurative and abstraction; selections from the Museum of Art permanent collection and work by faculty who teach drawing in the Department of Art and Design,” said Museum of Art Director Mark Rigsby.

Works of drawing and painting professor Jim Meade hang on the walls among the work of other alumni. Meade will be giving a gallery lecture titled “Consideration of Linear Composition and Space: The Paintings of Piero della Francesca” on Oct. 25 at 7 p.m. at the museum.

“The opening was great,” Rigsby said. “We had a lot of alumni come from out of town, like Texas, Louisiana, Alabama, southern Mississippi, Florida, South Carolina and New Jersey. We must have had over a hundred people show.”

As the crowd grew, so did the interest of the people studying each piece of art.

“I could have stood there for hours looking at those pieces,” alumna Theresa Baldo said. “I want some of them on my wall at home. Coming into it as someone who has graduated and gotten out of the art scene, it inspires me to get back into it.”

“I feel very connected to the museum,” said Frances Karnes, director of the Center for Gifted Studies at USM. “They have such wonderful shows.”

According to Rigsby, the show was made possible through the support of Partners for the Arts.

More information about the Museum of Art and the Department of Art and Design can be found online at www.usm.edu/visual-arts.