The Steckline Gallery at Newman University will present “Taco Bell Interior” featuring art by Kevin P. Kelly.
The exhibition will begin with a Final Friday reception from 5 to 7 p.m. Feb. 23 and will be on display through March 23. Both the reception and admission to the gallery are free and open to the public.
An “Art for Lunch” presentation by the artist will be held noon to 1 p.m. Tuesday, Feb. 27, in the gallery. A light lunch will be served on a first-come, first-serve basis. Guests are also welcome to bring their lunch. This event is also free and reservations are not required.
Kelly received a Bachelor of Art Education in 2001 and Master of Fine Arts in 2008, both from Wichita State University. He has been published in “Studio Visit Magazine,” “New American Paintings” and “Wichita Artists in their Studios.” He has shown in more than a dozen art galleries locally as well as out of state.
Kelly said, “I have mostly been conditioned to approach abstract painting as an interior space that blends personal, emotional release with the modernist desire to seek out perfected form. The emphasis is on withdrawal, and perhaps a higher plane of perception and expression.”
He continued, “I am looking for moments when concerns for the everyday displace the modernist tendency for isolation. I am also looking for moments when the everyday becomes painterly. While working through the layers of a piece, I am at times trying to freeze or deflate an artistic gesture, and at times trying to reanimate the frozen gesture. I want the work to be driven by the play between the exterior and interior forces that drive our lives.”
The Steckline Gallery is located inside the De Mattias Fine Arts Center on the Newman campus, 3100 McCormick. The gallery is open 9 a.m. to 4 p.m. Monday through Friday or by appointment. For more information, call 316-942-4291, ext. 2199.
