Largest collection of State Art Collection works on tour in the Upstate

GREENWOOD, SC – January 18, 2013 – For the first time, both installments of the largest traveling exhibition of State Art Collection work are on the road and on display at the same time. Contemporary Conversations Part II is on view now through Jan. 31 at the Arts Center of Greenwood. Contemporary Conversations Part I runs through Feb. 6 at three locations in Clemson: The Arts Center, and Clemson University’s Lee Gallery and the Brooks Center for the Performing Arts.

Curated by Eleanor Heartney, author and contributing editor to Art in America and Artpress, Contemporary Conversations is composed of 118 works by 95 contemporary South Carolina artists. The exhibition is designed to suggest both the quality and diversity of the state’s cultural heritage and includes everything from hard-edge geometric abstraction to surrealist-tinged dreamscapes. Works are inspired by social issues, memory, local and national history, imagination, art of the past and aesthetic theory. Together these works reflect the many voices and diverse concerns of South Carolina artists.

Visit the South Carolina Arts Commission’s website to preview the Contemporary Conversations gallery of work and the list of artists, and read more about the State Art Collection, including how to bring the collection to your community. In addition to Contemporary Conversations, two additional traveling exhibitions are available: The African-American Voice and Points of Departure: Vessels Forms from the State Art Collection.

Established in 1967 as one of the first programs of the South Carolina Arts Commission, the State Art Collection is composed of 448 works in a variety of media and styles produced by 277 artists.

For more information, contact Harriett Green, (803) 734-8696.