"Untitled (Red Ribbon Hair)"

Seventeen drawings by a nationally-recognized and award-winning artist are on display at Windgate Art & Design at the University of Arkansas – Fort Smith through Oct. 13, with a reception slated for 5-8 p.m. Sept. 19.  

 

Artwork by Robert Pruitt is on display in the Windgate Gallery, located at 535 N. Waldron Road. The exhibit, titled “Aethiopia Awakening,” is free and open to the public.

 

The drawings, which are a selection of Pruitt’s work from the last two years of studio practice, feature portraits that explore ideas of futurism, escape, divinity and race, according to the artist statement.

 

“I blend together references to traditional cultures, history, technology, and a host of other notions to create images that for me express a sense of majesty and timelessness,” Pruitt said in the artist statement. “Through these drawings, I am attempting to shape a network of identities that have considered the spectrum of humanity within a framework of blackness as opposed to a Eurocentric worldview.”

 

Pruitt has exhibited his work since 1996 and was a participating artist in the 2006 Whitney Biennial. His work is in the collections of the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York City, the Nasher Museum of Art at Duke University, the Studio Museum of Harlem and the Dallas Museum of Art.

 

He is a recipient of the Artadia Artist Award, Louis Comfort Tiffany Foundation Award, and Joan Mitchell Foundation Award. Recently, Pruitt was awarded residencies at the Bemis Center for Contemporary Art and the Joan Mitchell Center in New Orleans, La.

 

He earned his bachelor’s degree in fine arts from Texas Southern University and his master’s degree in fine arts from the University of Texas at Austin.

 

For more information, contact Don Lee, associate professor of art at UAFS, at 479-788-7542 or don.lee@uafs.edu.