|
|
Colleen Sterling
The interconnection of body and spirit - or of the
universe, in general - is a strong theme running through
the work of Colleen Sterling. Combining engraved or
sandblasted and painted plexiglas panels with back
panels drawn with charcoal paste (acrylic gel mixed with
charcoal powder), Sterling juxtaposes athletes with
angels, Greek spiritual models and other symbolic
images to suggest the potential for personal excellence.
Colleen Sterling is known for her challenging subject
matter and innovative techniques. She works in black
and white with mixed-media drawings using charcoal
paste, which she developed and which is unique to her
work. She then draws on acrylic (plexiglas) panels, and
mounts these in front of the back drawings in order to
create a layering of imagery. Her themes are socio-
political, personal, spiritual and narrative.
Sterling began her formal art studies in the early 1970s
at The School of the Art Institute, Chicago, and
beginning with an interest in sculpture. She furthered
her education with courses at the University of
Cincinnati, Ohio and the Massachusetts College of Art,
Boston, before locating to the North Georgia mountains
in 1989. It was at Massachusetts College of Art that
Sterling learned her currently used processes of
engraving and sandblasting on plexiglas, having taken
several glass shop courses and later managing the
glassworks studio of former GAS president, Bonnie
Gibbs.
Sterling has exhibited widely throughout the country
during her more than 20-year professional career. In the
1993-94 exhibition seasons alone, her work was seen
in Amarillo, Texas at the Amarillo Art Center (her first
one-woman museum exhibition), Santa Monica,
California at The Lowe Gallery, and in numerous group
shows including Brenau University’s Annual GALA and
the Quinlan Art Center invitational (both in Gainesville,
Georgia) as well as at An Art Place, in Chicago, Illinois.
In April 1997, she showed at the River Gallery in the Bluff
View Arts District in Chattanooga, Tennessee, as well
as in group exhibitions with her Atlanta representative,
Gallerie Dorita! In the Buckhead Art District, including a
feature exhibition in September 1998.
In January 1994, the artist was featured in a one-woman
exhibition at Young Harris College in Young Harris,
Georgia, and in February 1995, her work was again
featured in a college setting at Vanderbilt University in
Nashville, Tennessee. Museum exhibitions have
included the Berkshire Art Museum in Pittsfield,
Massachusetts, The Riverside Museum in Riverside,
California, the Contemporary International Museum of
Art of Georgia, the Telfair Museum of Art in Savannah,
and the Hunter Museum of America Art, in an exhibition
juried by art critic and historian Donald Kuspit, who
awarded a second level prize for Sterling’s entry.
For the 1996 cultural festivities, the artist was asked to
fill City Gallery East (the city gallery of Atlanta, host to the
26th Olympiad) with more than 20 athletic based
artworks. This exhibition, entitled “Personal Excellence,”
was well received and enthusiastically reviewed. Also in
1996, Sterlin’s biographical data was selected for
inclusion in the 20th edition of the Marquis Who’s Who
of American Women. In 1997, she was selected as an
honoree for “Georgia Women in the Visual Arts,”
sponsored by the Georgia Commission on Women, in
conjunction with the Department of Human Resources
in Atlanta, for Georgia Women’s History Month, which
was held at the Nexus Contemporary Art Center.
Secretary of State Lewis Massey presented the awards
for “women who have made a significant contribution to
the visual arts in Georgia.”
Sterling was selected as one of 18 artists, among a field
of 25,000 applicants, to create a site-specific artwork for
Hartsfield International Airport. The competition was
sponsored by the Department of Aviation, Atlanta Bureau
of Cultural Affairs. The work, entitled “Flight of the Spirit,”
was installed in the spring of 1999. She was
commissioned by the Hyatt Roissy near Paris, France,
with the Young Men’s Christian Association in Illinois,
and the Fulton County Arts Council in Atlanta.
Sterling’s artwork can be found at the Hunter Museum,
Chattanooga, and in several corporate and private
collections in Boston, Chicago, and Atlanta, in California
and throughout the southeast, and internationally in
France and Germany.
|
