Weatherspoon Art Museum NewsRelease

“On Wanting to Grow Horns: The Little Theatre of Tom Knechtel.” Opens 1 p.m. Sunday, April 21, with artist’s talk at 2 p.m. Runs through July 14. Weatherspoon Art Museum, corner Spring Garden and Tate streets.
Admission and parking free. Contact: (336) 334-5770
Hours: 10 a.m. – 5 p.m. Tue., Thu., Fri., 10 a.m. – 8 p.m. Wed., 1 – 5 p.m. Sat., Sun. Closed Mon.

TOM KNECHTEL EXHIBITION PREMIERS APRIL 21 AT WEATHERSPOON

    GREENSBORO — A traveling exhibition of paintings and drawings by Los Angeles-based artist Tom Knechtel will premier at the Weatherspoon Art Museum at The University of North Carolina at Greensboro at 1 p.m. Sunday, April 21,

Tom Knechtel: "A Middle Aged Sheherazade"

and continuing through July 14. The artist will present a talk about the development of his work at 2 p.m., followed by a public reception sponsored by the Weatherspoon Guild. Admission is free. It is one of three exhibitions to open in April at the museum.

    “On Wanting to Grow Horns: The Little Theatre of Tom Knechtel” is a mid-career survey of Knechtel’s work from 1976 to 2001, comprised of  25 oil paintings and approximately 70 works on paper in watercolor, gouache, pastel, charcoal, silverpoint and graphite and ink. Knechtel, who is known for his technical virtuosity, employs scrupulous technique to create works of exquisite detail inspired by puppet shows, Kabuki theater, fairy tales, zoological prints and the art of earlier artists, including William Blake and Hieronymus Bosch. His phantasmagoric works set forth intricate and meandering narratives which invite the viewer to step up for a closer look at his labyrinth of private fantasy, colorful spectacle, and imaginary terrains. A video interview with the artist will play through the duration of the exhibition.
A “Weatherspoon Film Fantasy” will round out the exhibition, featuring five classic films by Frederico Fellini, Jean Cocteau and others.

    Accompanying the exhibition is a 128-page hardcover catalogue with color and black-and-white images and plates, an essay by the exhibition curator, Anne Ayer, director of the Ben Maltz Gallery at Otis College of Art and Design in Los Angeles, and an essay by Ron Platt, curator of exhibitions for the Weatherspoon. Copies of the catalogue will be on sale at the museum gift shop.

Also in April

    Two other exhibitions open in April at the Weatherspoon.  “Faces and Figures: Selections from the Permanent Collection” opens Sunday, April 7 and runs through July 28, and “Stephen Dean: Pulse,” opens Sunday, April 21, to run through July 28.

    Dean is a young, French-American artist now living in New York who works in a variety of mediums. “Pulse” is a riveting and painting-like video, which incorporates footage gathered by Dean during the festival of Holi in the northern Indian state of Uttar Pradesh. The festival marks the arrival of spring, when people throng the streets to douse one another with colored powders, water and glitter, transforming the streets into rivers of glistening color.  Dean has exhibited extensively in the United States and Europe, and his work is held in many private, corporate and public collections in the United States and abroad. One of his drawings, “Untitled, (Help Wanted Half Page),” 1994, was included in the collection of drawings given to the Weatherspoon last year by world-renowned collectors Werner and Sarah-Ann Kramarsky, and is included in the current exhibition, “A Way with Words.”

    The exhibition “Faces and Figures” will feature favorites from the Weatherspoon’s permanent collection, including Willem de Kooning’s “Woman,” well-known works by Saul Baizerman, Louise Nevelson, David Smith and Peter Agostini, and recent acquisitions by notable artists Leon Golub, Susanna Coffey, and Greensboro native Beverly McIver.
Founded in 1942, the Weatherspoon is a cultural resource for the Triad. Visitors can tour the galleries free of charge Tuesdays through Sundays. More information about the museum is available online at http://weatherspoon.uncg.edu.

Weatherspoon Film Fantasy

    The following classic films will be shown in conjunction with “On Wanting to Grow Horns: The Little Theatre of Tom Knechtel.” Admission is free. Films are not rated and parental discretion is advised.

    Beauty and the Beast (1946) 7 p.m. Wednesday, April 24. French Surrealist, Jean Cocteau's black- and-white version of the classic tale of the self-sacrificing beauty whose love turns the beast into a handsome prince. French with subtitles. 90 min.
    Fabulous Adventures of Baron Munchhausen (1965) 7 p.m. Wednesday, May 15. A masterpiece of animation by Czechoslovakian director, Karel Zeman. Film mixes live action, antique engravings, and animation in a dazzling tour-de-force of fantasy, and is regarded as one of the great works of the cinema. English. 75 min.
    Amarcord (1974) 7 p.m. Wednesday, June 12. Federico Fellini's nostalgic, fantastic, and funny reminiscence of growing up in the town of Rimini. Italian with subtitles. 127 min.
    The Emperor’s Nightingale (1948) 7 p.m. Wednesday, June 26. One of the great names in puppet animation, Jiri Trnka is often referred to as the Disney of Eastern Europe. Based on the Hans Christian Anderson fairytale, this stop-motion animation mixes puppets with live-action. English. 70 min.
    The Brothers Quay 7 p.m. Thursday, July 11. Masters of stop-motion animation, the Brothers Quay are best known for their miniaturization, haunting imagery, and surrealist worlds. Familiar to MTV and popular culture, the Quays have created animated films since the early 80s. A selection of film shorts will be shown including "Street of Crocodiles." 60 min.