UNIVERSITY GALLERY PRESENTS "JOINT MASTER OF FINE ARTS PROGRAM EXHIBITION"

Old Dominion University Gallery opens "Joint Master of Fine Arts Program Exhibition" with a reception at 7 p.m. Saturday, Jan. 20.

The reception and exhibition, which continues through March 11, are free and open to the public.

The exhibition features work from students currently enrolled in the Joint Graduate Program in Visual Studies at Norfolk State University and Old Dominion University. Included are works by Sandra Barrett, Elizabeth Carbocci, Lauriana Acrhibold Cohen, Erin Cross, Christy Frederick, Mark Guilbault, Ralph Irby, Diana Nicholson, Particia Sterritt and John Runner.

The program traditionally has encouraged students to transcend media-specific boundaries. Barrett, for example, uses mixed media transfer to explore the possibility of isolation within a crowd. Also using mixed media, Carbocci's installations explore how patterns and spatial organizations interact, while Frederick's fabric pieces penetrate into Western dictates of feminine beauty and Runner employs crutches and hypodermic syringes to evoke images of weaponry.

Irby's figurative charcoal drawings depict ideas in social realism, while Sterritt uses charcoal over black-and-white photographs to explore the application of cultural belief systems to the natural world. Cohen's weaving reinterprets indigenous Panamanian techniques and dress. Cross will exhibit a series of woodblock
prints, Guilbault presents a large-scale steel sculpture and Nicholson will also present current work.

For more information about the Visual Studies program, visit http://www.odu.edu/al/art/vistudies.html.

The University Gallery, located at 350 W. 21st St., Norfolk, is open noon to 3 p.m. Tuesday through Thursday; noon to 5 p.m. Friday and Saturday; and 1 to 4 p.m. Sunday. For more information call 683-2355 or go to http://www.odu.edu/al/art/gallery.