Exhibitions

CHRISTIAN RIEBEN: HEROIC PAINTING

Tipton Gallery (ETSU) / 126 Spring St., Johnson City, TN December 1, 2016 - January 27, 2017

Christian Rieben

The ETSU Department of Art & Design and Slocumb Galleries in conjunction with the Urban Redevelopment Alliance and Honors College present Heroic Painting by Christian Rieben. The exhibit runs from December 1, 2016 to January 27, 2017, at the Tipton Gallery, with opening reception on December 2, First Friday, from 6 to 8 p.m.. The artist’s talk is scheduled on January 27, 2017, Friday at 6 p.m., at the Tipton Gallery.

Rieben describes the works in the Heroic Painting exhibit as addressing “mythology -- in the greater culture, in Art, and in an individual existential sense.” His muse include mysterious characters, evocative locations, and dramatic actions, these images inspire his imagination, and with whom he connects emotionally, as they transforms into various elements of Rieben’s visual narratives. He stated that these “painted environments are landscapes of the psyche as much as they are physical places”.

Furthermore, Rieben’s work pays homage to the complex process and history of painting as art practice. He added that he has “grown increasingly interested in the process of painting, how a painting is an object that records its own construction,” and thus “how the process of the construction - the movement of the artist's body, the artist's decisions, both good and bad, the serendipitous phenomena, all contribute to a work's ability to generate empathy in the viewer.” Viewers are invited to Rieben’s soiree with his romantic ideas about art, his ‘heroic’ painting as “field of exploration” of himself, of culture and aesthetic practice.

Rieben is a visiting faculty at ETSU’s Department of Art & Design. He received his Bachelor of Arts from the University of California in Santa Cruz, CA and his Master of Fine Arts from the School of the Arts Institute of Chicago, IL. To view more about the artist’s work, please visit christianrieben.com.

Tipton Gallery is located at 126 Spring St., Downtown Johnson City. Open Thursdays and Fridays 5 to 7 p.m., with extended hours on First Fridays/receptions, and by appointment. All events are free and open to public. For info, email Slocumb Galleries’ Director Karlota Contreras-Koterbay at contrera@etsu.edu or call/text 423.483.3179.