Garden City, NY - July 22, 2015 - "A modern twist on an medieval technique" -- Richmond Lewis’s recent egg tempera paintings evoke a sense of animation through interwoven shapes, delicate line, and richly complex color.
The Adelphi University Exhibitions Program is excited to announce our first exhibit for the Fall 2015 semester entitled, Paintings by Richmond Lewis. Lewis’ art has gone through various phases and styles throughout her career, and draws upon numerous traditions of art from around the world. This series of works in egg tempera will be on view from August 11 through September 22, 2015 in the Ruth S. Harley University Center Gallery. There will be an artist reception on September 15 from 5:00 p.m. to 7:00 p.m. Light refreshments will be served. All are welcome.
Egg tempera is a technique that dates back centuries. Ground pigments are mixed with egg yolk and thinned with water to make a fast-drying medium. Through vivid colors and dramatic patterns and compositions, Lewis has taken a medium known primarily from medieval religious painting and turned it into something truly contemporary. Her elegant designs create a sense of life, motion, and emotion.
Richmond Lewis was born in Tokyo and spent her early years in Japan. She graduated from the Rhode Island School of Design with the top painting honor, the Florence Lief Prize. In the 1980s and ’90s she exhibited her oil paintings and ink drawings in galleries in Soho and the East Village. In the late 1990s, Lewis took a hiatus from exhibiting, during which she studied traditional water-based techniques, including Japanese woodblock printing, Russian icon-writing, and Tibetan thangka painting. Since 2006 she has been working in egg tempera. What makes these works so striking are the modern twists that she takes to make these techniques her own.
Lewis writes in her artist’s statement:
“I like to think of the shapes in my paintings as animate—reaching, pushing, or growing against constraints, and coexisting with other interwoven to form the surface of the painting.”
The Ruth S. Harley University Center Gallery is open daily, from 11:00am to 5:00pm. To learn more about the artists and view glimpses of the exhibition, please visit here. Like us on our ‘Adelphi University Galleries’ Facebook page or find us on Twitter at @AUGalleries.
About Adelphi University: New York’s Adelphi University is a nationally ranked, doctoral research university where students succeed by gaining the skills, knowledge and exposure to thrive as professionals and active citizens in an interconnected and fast-paced global society. Today, nearly 8,000 students from 38 states and 46 countries pursue degrees in person and online through Adelphi’s eight distinguished schools and programs—the College of Arts and Sciences, the Gordon F. Derner Institute of Advanced Psychological Studies, the Honors College, the Robert B. Willumstad School of Business, the Ruth S. Ammon School of Education, University College, the College of Nursing and Public Health and the School of Social Work. Chartered in 1896, Adelphi is known for offering a personalized education—one is which students are mentored by talented and committed faculty members and readily find opportunities to initiate, innovate, explore and understand. With dynamic learning hubs on Long Island, in Manhattan and in the Hudson Valley, Adelphi serves communities, both regionally and globally, through the research and practice of its faculty, the collaborative initiatives undertaken by its centers and programs, the staging of distinguished cultural events and, most essentially, the education of future leaders and informed citizens.