The next "Listen to Your Art" lecture will take place at 1:30 p.m. on Thursday, October 21. Tom Birkner will discuss the life and work of Latvian-American artist Vija Celmins. The lecture will take place at the Museum of Art, 491 N. Main St., in the upstairs Studio A. Masks are required for all participants, regardless of vaccination status.
Vija Celmins is a visual artist from Riga, Latvia and is best known for her photo-realistic paintings and drawings of natural environments and phenomena such as the ocean, spider webs, star fields, and rocks. Since the 1960s Celmins has been included in hundreds of group exhibitions and the focus of over forty solo exhibitions all over the world. She currently resides in New York City and is represented by the Matthew Marks Gallery. Born in New Jersey in 1966, Tom Birkner has exhibited his paintings on an international level for over 30 years. His work has been shown in numerous cities such as Newark, New York, Chicago, Los Angeles, San Francisco, Milan and Venice. In 2003, he was one of the artists chosen to represent the U.S. in the First Beijing International Biennale. His work has been reviewed in the journals Art In America, ART News, Tema Celeste, Flash Art, The New York Times, and The New York Observer among others. A graduate of Rutgers University and Penn State, Tom has taught at Drew University, Madison, NJ; Parsons The New School For Design in NY and Paris, and is currently an assistant professor at The University of Texas at El Paso. He is represented by Gerald Peters Contemporary, Santa Fe, NM and Paul Thiebaud Gallery, San Francisco.
For more information, please contact Bryan Lee, Education Curator, at BLee@las-cruces.org or 575-541-2217. The museum is located at 491 N. Main Street and is accessible from RoadRUNNER Transit Route 1 Stop 36. For additional information, visit the website at: MUSEUMS | Las Cruces, NM (las-cruces.org) or follow us on Facebook and Instagram @LCMuseums.