Alexis Hicks & Lauren Willis Opening 11.19

Watkins College of Art, Design & Film is pleased to invite the public to its second Senior Thesis Exhibition of the season. This Is an A B Conversation will feature Alexis Hicks and Lauren Willis, both Bachelor of Fine Arts in Fine Art degree candidates. An opening reception for their exhibition will be held on Friday, November 19, from 5:30-8pm in the Brownlee O. Currey, Jr. Gallery on campus. This event is free and open to the public.

In This Is an A B Conversation,Hicks and Willis will present one roomful of visual hypotheses regarding the state of the human body's relationship to the world. The two have come together to offer distinct bodies of work that converge in an emphasis on the innate characteristics of physicality. Leaning, stacking, tumbling, or stuttering, the significance of gesture pervades. The result is a series of awkward and playfully conflicting conversations that beg the question: What tethers you to the world?
         
Hicks, a Nashville native, centers her work on the psychological relationship between people and everyday objects. Through simple material sculptures and paintings, she will explore the collection, possession, and treatment of objects as they gradually become extensions of the human psyche. Willis, from Benton, Ark., is concerned with the tendency of humans to rely on intermediaries rather than their own bodies. She will use painting, video projection, and digital printing to deconstruct the figure, referencing the shifting conditions of the body and the bewildering effect this can have on individual or collective identity.