Media Relations Contact: Elizabeth Burke-Dain, 312.344.8695 or eburkedain@colum.edu
Brazilian Textile Artist Goya Lopes Weaves the Story of her People
Chicago, December 2007 –As part of the 2008 African Heritage Celebration, Goya Lopes: The African Diaspora in Brazil, is an art exhibition at Columbia College Chicago’s Glass Curtain Gallery that uses textile design as the primary medium to create the story of the various African cultures and experiences transported to Brazil during the period of the slave trade.
The exhibition will open on January 30 and run through February 29, 2008 at Glass Curtain Gallery, 1104 S. Wabash Avenue. An opening reception will be held on January 30 from 5pm to 7pm. The reception and exhibition are free and open to the public. Gallery hours are 9am to 5pm M,T,W,F and 9am to 7pm Thursdays. For more information please visit www.colum.edu/cspaces or call the gallery director, Mark Porter, at 312.344.6643.
The African Diaspora is global, yet each country’s experience tells a different tale and is kept alive by the artists who pass down their stories from generation to generation. In Bahia, Brazil, Goya Lopes is one such artist. Known throughout Brazil for her colorful prints and clothing design, Lopes has chosen to create a series of work based on the history of her people in Bahia.
This traveling exhibition is co-sponsored by the Liberal Education Department and is part of Columbia College Chicago’s ongoing, institution-wide initiative, Critical Encounters. This year’s Critical Encounters focus is on Poverty and Privilege. The college has chosen this focus as a way of questioning the complex myths and realities that arise out of our cultural and social beliefs about those who have and those who have not.
www.colum.edu/criticalencounters
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