Gallery director Virginia Miller was one of five speakers in a symposium on “East/West: Visually Speaking” the first group exhibition of contemporary Chinese art curated from the artists rather than from private collections.
Being held at the Paul and Lulu Hilliard University Art Museum, University of Louisiana at Lafayette from Jan. 22 through May 1st, the exhibition was coordinated by Miller, who has held three major exhibitions of Chinese contemporary works at ArtSpace/Virginia Miller Galleries.
The exhibition was curated over a two-year period by Dr. Lee Gray, who moderated the symposium. Also speaking were two of the show’s artists, Ma Baozhong and Luo Weiguo, along with the critic, curator and author Lilly Wei.
“East/West: Visually Speaking” is illustrated extensively in a 100-page catalog that includes essays by Lilly Wei and Dr. Gray. In its foreword, Museum Director Mark A. Tullos, Jr. states that “I particularly would like to thank Virginia Miller, whose experience and knowledge of the artists and their associated representatives was invaluable to the curatorial process.”
“As a university museum our mission is to offer exhibitions that provoke thought and create dialogue,” Tullos notes. “This is probably one of the most significant international projects undertaken by an American museum in the South.”
In her essay, Wei describes the exhibition as “a captivating and informative look at the globalized human and political comedy in which imported aesthetics collide with native ideologies to create strange and at times wonderful fusions.”
Events held in conjunction with the exhibition included a celebration of the Chinese New Year featuring acrobatic lion dancers.
For more information on the exhibition or to order a catalog, contact the museum online here.