The diversity of the human form inspires Emily Teets.
Her ceramics feature the figure whether it’s in three-dimensional form, such as legs, feet or arms emerging from a vase, or in two-dimensional form, such as a nude figure carved into a clay slab.
Teets, a senior who will graduate from the University of West Florida next month with a bachelor’s degree in fine arts, will feature her ceramics in “Synthesis: A Group BFA Exit Exhibition” at The Art Gallery in the Center for Fine and Performing Arts.
Other graduating students who will have work on display include Patti Gillespie and Lexie Reames.
“I like working with clay because it is feels to me so much more hands-on than drawing or printmaking.” Teets said. “I feel like there is a back-and-forth that happens when you are working with clay. You can build onto it or carve into it.”
Gillspie, who commutes to UWF from Niceville, will have a group of 10 portraits on display. The portraits are of “everyday heroes.”
“The purpose of the painting project was to honor individuals in the Niceville community who are a point of light,” she said. “They are described as going above and beyond in many ways to make our community a better place to live.”
Gillespie contacted several organizations in the community where volunteers give their time and asked members to nominate a person who deserved to be recognized.
Among the 10 are North Bay Fire District Chief Bryon Bennett, who spends time reading to children, and Pat Futch, who volunteers for the Emerald Coast Children’s Advocacy Center.
Lexie Reames specializes in oil on oversized wood panels or on canvas. Like Teets, Reames often begins her process with the human form because of its narrative potential. She paints contradicting conditions of dream and reality. She changes familiar forms into a combination of things, creating a blur of cause and effect. Figures float into uncanny scenarios. The juxtapositions of illogical, disturbing and erotic subject matter provide social commentary on gender restriction.
“In my work,” Reames wrote in her artist statement, “Colors lure, obscurities spellbind and phantasms swim.”
“Synthesis: A Group BFA Exit Exhibition” opens Nov. 17 and runs through Dec. 11. A reception takes place from 5-7 p.m. Nov. 17.
The Art Gallery, also known as TAG, is open Tuesday through Friday from 10 a.m.-4 p.m. and Saturday from noon to 4 p.m. Admission is free. For more information, call Nick Croghan, TAG UWF art director, at 850.474.2696.
The mission of TAG is to challenge, stimulate and engage students and the greater public through direct interaction with works of contemporary art.
This article is part of a collaboration between WUWF and the UWF Center for Research and Economic Opportunity.
