The work of UT art students and alumni has a knack for finding its way into notable art galleries and museums. In the past three years alone, for instance, two UT grads—Kelley Walker and Wade Guyton—were represented in the Whitney Biennial, and plenty more graduates have seen their creations surface in exhibitions both in the […]

Witte de With Center for Contemporary Art was founded in 1990 and has since played an extremely important role in the cultural scene in Rotterdam. Locally, but also internationally, the institution has always seen its responsibility in addressing a broad audience, while contributing to what you might think of as a more culture-specific or critical […]

There they were, sitting on the steps of the Art and Architecture building on the campus of the University of Tennessee in Knoxville. The hip art kids. Sure, I took my History of Graphic Design class as an elective towards my Anthropology degree (thus giving the art deco prints of old booze ads in my […]

It didn’t help that, the day the Art Gallery of Knoxville was slated to open, the city demolished the bridge—the Gay Street Viaduct—that would otherwise connect it with the rest of downtown. In effect, it was cut off, geographically at least, from downtown’s budding art scene before it even got started. Luckily, Art Gallery founders […]

First introduced to the paintings of Hackworth Ashley by Lee Wells’ curated “future perfect” wall at –scope Hamptons last summer, I was an immediate fan. Anyone who knows my style, knows this is it. “Is that Bill Cosby with his dick out?” And the rainbows! It looked to me like Bill himself couldn’t help but […]

In the 80s, on a rough foundation laid in the 60s and 70s by a small group of committed art lovers from Rotterdam, a well-structured art policy came into being. Rotterdam started to compete with the capital city of the Netherlands and succeeded. Those confronted with the hermetic and crowded city of Amsterdam were attracted […]

This summer, the Witte de With Center for Contemporary Art, Rotterdam hosted “Photosynthesis,” an overview of ecological art by Danish artist Tue Greenfort. Composed of diverse pieces, with varying mood, medium and subject matter, the exhibition can be viewed as a metaphorical ecosystem. Photosynthesis reveals interconnections between artworks that are at first glance unrelated. By […]

Less than two years ago, Dutch artist Joanneke Meester made national headlines with a small pistol, sewn from her own skin. Recently, she participated in the group exhibition, “Fantasy Island – Exhibition Robinson” in Mama: Showroom for Media and Moving Art Rotterdam, located at the Witte de Withstraat. Her work reflects her continued fascination with […]

In 2003, I opened Dust Gallery in Las Vegas with the purpose of exhibiting emerging contemporary artists that lived and worked in Las Vegas. Coming from a non-profit background, specifically the Institute of Contemporary Art in Boston, I was initially inclined to operate Dust as a non-profit art space. At that time, however, there were […]

Walking at a brisk pace, you could traverse the Witte de Withstraat, a relatively short street in Rotterdam the Netherlands, from one end to another in four minutes. Or, taking in every exciting corner and bend, each nook and cranny, packed with studios, art centers, galleries and more, could last a full day with areas […]