Featured speaker is sculptor Aurora Robson
Artists, art lovers, environmentalists and ecologists from all over the Southeast will have the rare opportunity to hear a presentation and then participate in an open discussion about sculpture with artist Aurora Robson at the Oct. 5 Mid-South Sculpture Alliance ConFab in Chattanooga.
ConFab will kick off at 9 a.m. with the keynote speaker and wrap up around 4:30 p.m. at Chattanooga State Community College, 4501 Amnicola Hwy, CAT Building, Room 30. The cost ranges from $30 for MSA student members to $100 for non-members; members are $80. Lunch is included in the price. There also is an optional dinner at Puckett’s Grocery Store and Restaurant beginning at 7 p.m. for an additional $55.
Robson is a well-known multi-media artist who focuses on her meditative work on intercepting the plastic waste stream. The keynote will be followed by a discussion between the sculptor and the audience.
“Aurora Robson represents what's exciting and relevant with contemporary sculpture,” said sculptor and former MSA Board Vice President Roger Halligan. “Aurora's sculpture is both whimsical and deadly serious. Her use of an ‘archival material’ (discarded one-use plastics) engages the viewer to contemplate transformative beauty and the threats we bring to ourselves as consumers.”
Robson’s practice is about shifting negative trajectories. Her work formally references recurring nightmares that she had as a child, which she hybridizes with organic forms found in nature. Robson holds a double major (B.A.) in visual arts and art history from Columbia University.
Her work has been featured in Sculpture Magazine, Art in America, WIRED, Art & Antiques, the cover of Green Building + Design and other publications. She is a recipient of the Pollock Krasner Grant, a New York Foundation for the Arts Fellowship in Sculpture, a TED/Lincoln Re-Imagine Prize, a National Endowment for the Arts Art Work Grant and an Annenberg Scholar.
After Robson's presentation there will be a lunch buffet followed by the 10x10 scholarship presentations. This year 10 students won a $1,000 scholarship funded through a generous donation gifted to MSA by Dianne Komminsk. These talented students will share their work in 10-minute presentations.
ConFab attendees will tour and listen to a short presentation at Branch Technologies new plant. Branch Technologies is an architectural fabricator specializing in large-scale 3D printing. They bring unprecedented design freedom and resource stewardship to the construction industry.
To make a reservation: admin@midsouthsculpture.org or (423) 903-5648.