Lufkin, Texas, Sept. 18, 2017 — The Angelina College Fine Arts division will present an exhibition and installation of works by local artist Denise Stringer Davis. An opening reception will be held Oct. 3, 6- 7:30 p.m. and will include a brief talk by the artist. The show runs through Oct. 30. The event is open to the public and there is no charge for admission.
Denise Stringer Davis has been a practicing professional artist since the 1980s, exhibiting her work in shows throughout the United States. She earned her Bachelor of Fine Arts, her Master of Arts and the terminal degree the Master of Fine Arts here in Texas, with the MFA earned at Texas Christian University in Fort Worth.
Davis is currently the department head for Studio Arts at Lufkin High School where she has taught since 2007. Prior to that she also taught at Huntington Middle School, and at TCU in Fort Worth.
Davis’s work is aimed at giving the viewer an intimate experience, one that is inward in scope. She says of her work: “Pulling threads is my meditation on being human and the way I process reality and my daily life. I strive to make objects and images that evoke memories that we do not think about often or at all but nevertheless shape our perceptions. I once heard a poet describe a poem as a prayer of gratitude. My work is the physical embodiment of gratitude for my experiences.
“My art seeks to find the profound and the beautiful in the everyday. Physicality and tactility, which relate to the body of the viewer and to past experiences, serve to create a dialog between the viewer and the piece. Common materials, sounds, and actions contain significant beauty and meaning when isolated and considered in their own right.
“I am interested in the places where science, philosophy and spirituality intersect. Poetry, humor, and magic live there. Hope lives there. Space, time, memory and all things physical fluctuate, but that impermanence, when greeted with openness, invites us to take in every moment and revel in the connectedness of things as small as a virus to those as monumental as the universe.”
