The founders of Lehigh University saw art as integral to a well-rounded education. Following in the footsteps of Thomas Jefferson, who made his personal art collection accessible to students and faculty at the University of Virginia, Lehigh University’s first president, Henry Coppée, declared art one of the “elementary branches” of education….… Read More The Teaching Museum: Selections from the Permanent Collection
In printmaking, The Future Is Female, but so is the past. With or without the visibility they deserve, women artists have engaged the art of printmaking from the beginning. Requiring technical mastery, physical strength, and stamina, printmaking—or the art of producing multiple images or impressions from a single plate or matrix—has its origins in 8th century Japan … … Read More The Future is Female: Prints by Women Artists
Nelson Mandela emerges from the shadows after twenty-seven years in captivity; the Berlin Wall crumbles; Kurdish refugees flee from Iraq to southern Turkey – these are the scenes of the human condition. If it happened in the last thirty years, photojournalist Peter Turnley was there, camera in hand… … Read More Peter Turnley: The Compassionate Lens
Peter Berg (1948-1997) was known for his maze-like sculptural installations that moved in and out of existing architecture with discreet presence. Fabricated from standard building materials, Berg’s constructions of wood, sheetrock, spackle and paint often merged with their surroundings, sprouting walls, plinths, winding passageways, and rooms with no obvious entry points… … Read More Peter Berg: Labyrinths
Mexican photographer Pedro Meyer (b. 1935), is a pioneer of the digital revolution in contemporary photography, one of the first photographers to manipulate his images digitally. Because of its mechanical nature, photography has often been misconstrued an unbiased reproduction of a single moment, a snapshot of the exact truth – something that Meyer disputes … … Read More Pedro Meyer: Truth from Fiction
Horger Artist-in-Residence for Art | Architecture | Design. The Horger Artist-in-Residence is a semester-long residency that brings noteworthy talent to Lehigh University. Every year the residency rotates between the fields of Music, Theater or Art|Architecture|Design. … Read More Karyn Olivier
Photography has been a lifelong passion for LUAG Director and Chief Curator Ricardo Viera. When Viera first came to Lehigh University in 1974, his priority was to establish professional standards for the art works he found. To his dismay, he discovered—among the many paintings, prints, and coins which made up the fine art collection—there was only one photograph. With this discovery his first IDEA was born: to build a teaching collection centered around works-on-paper, including photography.… Read More Photographs Are Ideas
Artist and provocateur, Dieter Roth was one of the most influential European artists of the postwar period. Born in Germany, Roth (1930-1998) found asylum from WWII as a youth in Switzerland. Known for his use of unorthodox materials …… Read More Dieter Roth: Trophies, Bats, Dogs
The world of contemporary Japanese prints is a confluence of techniques, cross-cultural exchange, and historical influences. The effect of Japanese aesthetics on European artists like Whistler, Degas, and Van Gogh is well-known; but Japanese artists also borrowed many ideas from their contemporaries in the West.… Read More Contemporary Japanese Prints
Jack Youngerman (b.1926) belongs to the first generation of artists who set up studios in New York City’s abandoned industrial spaces during the 1950s and 1960s. … Read More Jack Youngerman: Prints
Join us to celebrate what would have been Wifredo Lam’s 115th birthday and the closing of the exhibition The Drawings of Wifredo Lam: 1940-1955. The party will take place at 6 PM in the LUAG Main Gallery, Zoellner Arts Center. Prosecco, a sparkling wine from Italy, and desserts will be served. This event marks one… Read More Wifredo Lam's 115th Birthday Celebration
Lehigh University Art Galleries is pleased to present The Drawings of Wifredo Lam: 1940 – 1955, the first monographic exhibition of works by Lam from a prestigious private Cuban collection to travel to the United States. Comprised of twenty-one rarely seen works on paper the exhibition will open to the public this August 30 and will remain on view until December 10, 2017.… Read More The Drawings of Wifredo Lam: 1940-1955
Special thanks to Tony Ulloa, Casa Serena Collection, for the loan of works to this exhibition. María Martínez-Cañas is a photographer who works beyond the limits of the camera. Conceptually driven, she dissects, collages, digitally manipulates, erases, and recombines images, resulting in a range of forms that includes: photomontage, camera-less photograms, sculptural installation, and archival… Read More María Martínez-Cañas
Organized by NAEMI (National Art Exhibitions of the Mentally Ill). Curated by Ricardo Viera. The term “outsider art” was coined by the English critic Roger Cardinal in 1972, taking as a starting point the original concept of “Art Brut” by French artist Jean Dubuffet. Today many terminologies exist—“visionary”, “self-taught”, “art of the mentally ill”—but ultimately… Read More Visionaries of the Light
Aaron Siskind (1903-1991) revolutionized photography and influenced successive generations of artists in all mediums. “When I make a photograph,” he wrote, “I want it to be an altogether new object.” Originally a documentary photographer, Siskind turned his probing eye toward the ordinary and overlooked: torn posters, graffiti, seaweed strewn on the beach. He collapsed the… Read More Aaron Siskind