Calendar of Events

Open to the Public
Location: Ingram Studio Art Center Gallery (Google map of this location)

The Vanderbilt University Department of Art welcomes to Space 204 an exhibition of compelling photographs by Jeremiah Ariaz. On display from Thursday, Feb. 21, through Thursday, March 14, Tucumcari documents a once thriving and now uncertain New Mexico community. An opening reception will be held Thursday, Feb. 21, from 4 to 6 pm.

The Tucumcari project, four years in the making, seeks to explore a community and way of life influx. Ariaz first visited the vibrant New Mexico small town of Tucumcari by happenstance in 2006, its centennial. He and his camera were at once drawn to the historic buildings and "the way their brilliant colors shone in the western sun light." Some time later, another trip down that same stretch of highway brought him back to Tucumcari and he was startled by the changes he saw - changes due to both the national economic downturn and local struggles. Ariaz has worked to tell the tale of "an American place caught between a vanishing past and an uncertain future."

Select photographs from Tucumcari have been featured in numerous exhibitions, including the Atlanta Photographers' Gallery (2009), the Halpert Biennial at the Turchin Center for the Arts (2009) (receiving the jurorís prize), and Center for the Arts (2010) and B Gallery in Rome, Italy (2013). In addition, two photographs are included in the 2011 publication, ìExploring Color Photographyî by Robert Hirsch. Also, while completing the series, he was twice named a finalist for the Michael P. Smith Fund for Documentary Photography.

Ariaz received his BFA from the Kansas City Art Institute, his MFA from the State University of New York at Buffalo and has exhibited his work and lectured both nationally and internationally. He was recipient of a Schomburg Fellowship as well as a Canadian-American Studies grant which led to the publication of the limited edition artist book, ìA Spectacular Fall,î and accompanying exhibition. Space 204 is located on the second floor of the E. Bronson Ingram Studio Art Center, 25th Avenue South and Garland on the Vanderbilt University campus. All Space 204 exhibitions are free and open to the public. Gallery hours are Monday through Friday, 10 am to 4 pm.

For more information, contact The Department of Art at 615-343-7241 or visit www.vanderbilt.edu/arts.