Cal Poly University Art Gallery to Exhibit Work by Erin Curtis Jan. 14-Feb. 5

Cal Poly’s Art and Design Department will present “100% Acrylic,” an exhibit featuring the work of painter and installation artist Erin Curtis. The show will open Thursday, Jan. 14, in the University Art Gallery in the Dexter Building (No. 34).

The evening will start with a talk by Curtis at 5:10 p.m. in the KTGY Gallery in the Engineering West Building (No. 21) Room 105, across Dexter Lawn. A reception will follow at 6 p.m. in the University Art Gallery.

“100% Acrylic” will include Curtis’s most recent paintings and several on-site installations, some of which will involve the energetic participation of art and design students. Installation elements include items that have been premade in the studio, ready-made materials such as contact paper, and site-specific painting and sculptural totem pieces made in the gallery. The installations will spill from the walls onto the floor, hang from the ceiling and
protrude from the walls.

About the Artist

Erin Curtis is a Washington, D.C.,-based artist whose work is influenced by visual languages of abstraction from around the globe and across history. She is particularly influenced by textiles, ritual body decoration, and architectural ornamentation. She earned her Master of Fine Arts in studio art from the University of Texas at Austin in 2007. She was named a Fulbright Scholar at the University of Rajasthan in Jaipur, India, and studied at the Skowhegan School of Painting and Sculpture in Madison, Maine. She has had a number of solo and group exhibitions, the most recent at Big Medium in Austin and at the University of Buffalo. She received an Idea Fund Grant from the Andy Warhol Foundation and Diverse Works in Houston.

The University Art Gallery is free and open to the public from 11 a.m. to 4 p.m. Tuesday through Saturday. It is located on the ground floor near the entrance to the Dexter Building.