The Rutgers–Camden Center for the Arts (RCCA) will continue The Big Read celebration, reveling in The Stories and Poems of Edgar Allan Poe, with two concurrent, free exhibitions from Nov. 11 to Dec. 20 in the Stedman Gallery: “Dark Eye Glances: Romantic Impulse in Landscape” and “Poe in Popular Culture: Selections from The Museum of Edgar Allan Poe, Richmond, Va.”
“Dark Eye Glances” features contemporary forms of landscape, with elements of romanticism, mystery, and imagination. The exhibition explores a strain of work that is nearly constant in American art since the emergence of the Hudson River School in the early 19th century. These contemporary artists draw their inspiration from both the land and the history of landscape art, both at home and abroad. The artists also bring a wide range of attitudes toward the ever-changing 21st-century landscape, expressed in unique conceptions and formal strategies.
Featured artists include painters Mark Green, Eric Holzman, John Lees, Brian Rutenberg, Rebecca Saylor Sack, Tom Uttech, and John Walker; photographers Donna Czapiga, and Norinne Betjmann; illustrator Christopher Hartshorne; and mixed-media artist Colleen McCubbin Stepanic.
The guest curators are Bruce Garrity and Noreen Scott Garrity. Noreen Scott Garrity serves as associate director of education for the RCCA. Bruce Garrity is a painter and independent curator, as well as an adjunct faculty member in the Department of Fine Arts at Rutgers–Camden.
The curators will discuss the exhibit in a talk on Tuesday, November 26, at 12:15 p.m. in the gallery.
“Poe in Popular Culture” features a variety of fascinating artifacts from Poe’s life and works, including a portrait once owned by Elmira Royster Shelton, Poe’s longtime love interest who was engaged to him at the time of his death. Other items include illustrations, movie posters, etchings, publicity stills, and comic strips.
From October through mid-December, the RCCA is celebrating Poe’s haunting stories and poems with a full calendar of free events, including a lecture series, performances, exhibitions, and storytelling workshops. The gallery is closed Nov. 28 to Dec. 1 due to the Thanksgiving holiday.
The remaining events are as follows:
Public Performing Arts Programs
Wednesday, Oct. 30, at 10:30 a.m. Storyteller extraordinaire Kyle Jakubowski of Audubon will present a “Not-So-Scary Stories” installment of his popular “Tall Tales with Kyle J,” for children ages 4 to 8 in the Nilsa I. Cruz-Perez Downtown Branch of the Camden County Library on the Rutgers–Camden campus. The storytelling session will be followed by an art activity.
Tuesday, Nov. 19, at 6 p.m. A recitation celebration, “Poe Out Loud,” will be held in the Walter K. Gordon Theater.
Thursday, Nov. 21, at 5 p.m. Fractured Mirror Productions will perform Shades of Poe in the Stedman gallery as part of Camden’s 3rd Thursday Art Crawl. The performance will begin at 5:30 pm.
Saturday, December 7, at 2 p.m. Jakubowski will present “Not-So-Scary,” but fun, stories for a December afternoon for children ages 4 to 8 in the Nilsa I. Cruz-Perez Downtown Branch of the Camden County Library on the Rutgers–Camden campus. The storytelling session will be followed by an art activity.
Speaker Series in the Stedman Gallery
Thursday, Nov. 14, at 12:15 p.m. Tyler Hoffman, a professor and chair of the English department at Rutgers–Camden, and co-director of the Walt Whitman Program in American Studies, will speak on “Poe and the Detectives.”
Monday, Dec. 2, at 12:15 p.m. Ellen Malenas Ledoux, an associate professor of English and director of the Women's and Gender Studies Program at Rutgers–Camden, will discuss “Poe and the Philadelphia Gothic Tradition.”
The Big Read is an initiative of the National Endowment for the Arts, in partnership with Arts Midwest. The program is designed to restore reading to the center of American culture. Camden is one of 77 communities nationwide participating in The Big Read from September 2013 through June 2014, and the only site in New Jersey this year. For more information about The Big Read, please visit NEABigRead.org.
The Stedman Gallery and the Walter K. Gordon Theater are located in the Fine Arts Complex, on Third Street, between Cooper Street and the Benjamin Franklin Bridge on the Rutgers–Camden campus. For directions to Rutgers–Camden, visit camden.rutgers.edu/resources/getting-to-campus.
The gallery is closed Nov. 28 to Dec. 1 due to the Thanksgiving holiday.
For more information on The Big Read events at Rutgers–Camden, or to have your own Edgar Allan Poe book group, call Noreen Scott Garrity at 856-225-6306. For a full listing of campus events, visit rcca.camden.rutgers.edu.