Arlington, TX – A restrospective collection of compelling photography comes to North Texas next month when Kenda North: Seeing is a Nervous Habit, A Retrospective opens at the Arlington Museum of Art. Kenda North is professor and head of photography at UT Arlington. She was Chair of the Art and Art History Department at UTA from 1991 to 1999. She received her MFA from the Visual Studies Workshop (University of Buffalo) in January 1976. She has taught at the School of the Art Institute in Chicago (76-77), the University of California at Riverside (79-89) and has been at UTA since 1989. She received the Honored Educator Award from the SPE South Central Region in 2009.
The exhibit will be open from August 19 – October 8, 2017 and will include numerous pieces by Kenda North as well as those from her past students. Those artists are: Delaney Allen, Jesse Morgan Barnett, Calen Barnum, Matt Bean, Jeff Bradley, Franklin Countryman, John Crouch, Annie Donovan, Ross Faircloth, Michael Gonzales, Michael Hoefle, Manuel Pecina, O. Gustavo Plascencia, Joy Simpson, Ashley Whitt and Betsy Williamson. Admission tickets will be available online at www.ArlingtonMuseum.org or may be purchased at the door.
North’s work is represented by Craighead Green Gallery in Dallas. She has had over fifty one-person exhibitions (national and international) and participated in hundreds of juried group exhibitions since 1977. Her work is in the public collections of over fifty museum and gallery collections including the Smithsonian, the Federal Reserve, LA County Museum of Art, San Francisco Museum of Modern Art and the Santa Barbara Museum of Art. A monograph of her work was published by Gallery Min in 1988 and her work has been reproduced in a range of photographic anthologies and exhibition catalogs.
Her work in hand applied dye transfer in the late ‘70s and early ‘80s marked her interest in color photography. Her process was documented in several publications and video programs including Darkroom Dynamics by Jim Stone, recently reprinted as a 35th Anniversary edition.
“Kenda North is a devoted photographer and teacher and she has willingly shared her passion and understanding of photography within the art communities locally and nationally,” said Kenneth Craighead, owner of Craighead-Green Gallery in Dallas. “Her photography is unique. She avoids the expected, preferring to open the door to new ideas bringing her beauty and complex messages to be shared with her students, her peers and with many collectors.” North has been affiliated with Craighead Green Gallery for over 15 years.
Kenda has worked in a range of color processes in her career including dye transfer, Cibachrome, dye coupler prints and digital fine art printing. Her archive is held at the DeGolyer Library, Southern Methodist University, Women of the Southwest Collection.
Executive Director, Chris Hightower, said, “North selected sixteen undergraduate alumni from the photography program at UTA to exhibit in conjunction with her retrospective. These artists were mentored by Professor North and went on to complete their MFA degrees and to develop their own art careers.”
The UTA artists are Delaney Allen, Jesse Morgan Barnett, Calen Barnum, Matt Bean, Jeff Bradley, Franklin Countryman, John Crouch, Annie Donovan, Ross Faircloth, Michael Gonzales, Michael Hoefle, Manuel Pecina, O. Gustavo Placencia, Joy Simpson, Ashley Whitt and Betsy Williamson.
For more information, please contact the Arlington Museum of Art at (817) 275-4600.
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