04/09/2003

AAES's Rodriguez Wins Montgomery Art Guild's Award of Excellence

AUBURN, Ala. — Terry Rodriguez, an award-winning visual artist from Auburn and a graphic designer for the Alabama Agricultural Experiment Station (AAES) and the Auburn University College of Agriculture, is one of only five Alabamians receiving an Award of Excellence from the Montgomery Art Guild as part of the gild’s first Alabama Exhibition: The Face of Alabama.

Ms. Rodriguez, who has been creating and exhibiting her art for more than 30 years, received a bachelor of fine arts from Auburn in 1969 and a master of science in textile design at Auburn in 1985. She has worked as a graphic designer at Auburn University since 1972 and is currently the designer for AAES’s ASK magazine, among many other publications and projects.

She has won numerous awards for her artwork, including the SouthTrust Bank Purchase Award at the Montgomery Art Guild Museum Show in 1990. Her work has been shown regionally in Alabama, Georgia, Florida, Louisiana, Texas and Chicago, Ill., and is in private collections throughout the South and in Europe and Australia.

Ms. Rodriguez uses her innate sense of frugality and her attraction to oddities, both natural and fabricated, in her work. Her pieces bring to life narratives with elements of history, relationship, psychology, humor and surprise. Her work consists of mixed-media (pastel, oil, stick, markers, collage and found objects) drawings and three dimensional constructions.

She is one of 41 Alabama artists whose work was accepted for The Face of Alabama exhibition, which is designed to present a fluid, diverse and inspired view of Alabama through the works of artists residing in the state.

The show is a collaboration between the Troy State University at Montgomery (TSUM) Rosa Parks Museum and the Montgomery Art Guild. It opened on April 3 and provides an opportunity for Alabama to be viewed in an ever-changing and integrative light. The exhibit encourages viewers to re-evaluate the values, principles and ideas that are Alabama and prods them to think about Alabama in a cultural context and from the fresh perspective of a variety of individual artists.

“This is the first time that I can recall that a show was structured to showcase only Alabama artists,” said Duran Seay, president of the Montgomery guild. “The show provides the opportunity to the viewer to re-examine how Alabamians are known stereotypically.”

The pieces in the show were limited to a 24- by 24-inch size because tourists typically purchase objects in that size range as souvenirs.

“In tourist shops, people might buy something that would remind them of this state,” Seay said. “They would see things like barns, cotton fields, hoop skirts or magnolias. Alabama is about much more than that, but this is all that people from the outside see us as. This exhibition breaks those myths.”

This exhibit, juried by acclaimed Alabama artist Frank Fleming of Birmingham, includes the work of professional artists from around the state. Fleming, who is an internationally renowned sculptor, is a native of Alabama.

Ms. Rodriguez’s work, which is titled “Clown House,” is a multimedia, three-dimensional piece using a variety of found objects. The piece depicts the astounded face of a clown peering from the window of a house. The door to the house is made of a computer board, and strips of metal tape measure form the steps to the house. A moon composed of watchworks shines down on the scene.

The exhibit can be viewed during the museum’s regular hours. The public also is invited to a panel discussion at the museum on April 19 at 1 p.m., when Ms. Rodriguez and other Award of Excellence winners will present and lecture about their works. On May 3 at 6 p.m., singer-songwriter and AU alum Kate Campbell will perform music composed for this exhibition. Admission to that concert is $10.

For more information on the exhibit or the events surrounding the show, contact Georgette Norman, director, TSUM Rosa Parks Museum, at (334) 241-8608.

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News from:

Office of Ag Communications & Marketing

Auburn University College of Agriculture
Alabama Agricultural Experiment Station
3 Comer Hall, Auburn University
Auburn, AL 36849
334-844-4877 (PHONE) 334-844-5892 (FAX)

Contact Jamie Creamer, 334-844-2783 or jcreamer@auburn.edu
Contact Terry Rodriguez, 334-844-5888 or trodrigu@acesag.auburn.edu
Photos of artwork and of Ms. Rodriguez are available upon request.

04/09/03

For immediate release