Total Eclipse, Lester Johnson
University of Michigan Museum of Art, Gift of Dr. Seymour and Barbara K. Adelson, 2005/2.62
The Stamelos Gallery Center is proud to present FOUR: Lester Johnson's Selected Works, an extensive collection of pieces created by renowned Detroit artist Lester Johnson.
The works displayed in this exhibition span almost six decades of the artist’s remarkable career and include paintings, collages, mixed media, lithographs, totemic sculpture, textiles, and three-dimensional handmade paper. Highlights of the show are pieces borrowed from the Flint Institute of Arts, the University of Michigan Museum of Art, and Wayne State University.
To make his art, Johnson has drawn deeply on the shared humanity of world cultures, the music of Duke Ellington and John Coltrane, the paintings of Alma Thomas, the poetry of Dudley Randall, and the prose of Richard Wright. The artist is an avid lover of music, and it gives him inspiration and direction throughout his creative process. The exhibition title is inspired by the song Four written by Miles Davis and John Hendricks. The song, a collaboration between two gifted artists, is written about four cherished things in life: truth, honor, happiness, and love. Artistic collaboration, storytelling, and tributes are some of the other major themes illustrated in Johnson’s fascinating work.
Opening Reception
Thursday, September 12, 2024, 5:00 p.m. - 7:00 p.m.
Artist talk at 6:00 p.m.
Reception is free to the public, free parking in UM-Dearborn lot.
Complimentary wine and hors d'oeuvres provided.
The Midnight Library, Bella Martincic
Want to know a secret? Here it is: Applied Art—animation, design, digital photography, drawing, graphic design, illustration, mixed media, painting, printmaking, sculpture, watercolor—has always been a hub of authentic, human-driven creativity on the UM- Dearborn campus. The Stamelos Gallery Center is proud to present Best Kept Secret: UMD Student, Faculty, and Alumni Art Show, showcasing the incredible talents of our university's arts community and the marriage of talent, vision, skill, and persistence that lies at the foundation of artmaking. The works encompass a variety of media from traditional to digital and embody the unique and diverse perspectives of the campus community.
Applied Art is one of the smallest programs on our campus, but its students are majors in a variety of fields, including Art History, Biology, Business, Communications, Education, Engineering, Journalism, Media Production, and Psychology.... to name just a few. In the Art Studio and Digital Arts Lab, students from all disciplines gather to make art, to train their eyes and their hands to be sharper and more dexterous than before, to let the left and right brains make their own connections, and to critique their works together. They seek out Applied Art courses to train their intellects to be observant and flexible, to express their own ideas and perspectives, and to assert their humanity in a process of slow and practical honing of skills that runs counter to the prevailing social and economic imperatives of speed, ease, and automation. At the same time, the practice of art depends on the evolution of science and technology. Art and science mirror each other in hypothesizing new ideas, in empirical methods of trial and error, and in breaking boundaries of what was and is, to open the doors to what could or could never be.
Opening Reception
Thursday, January 23, 2025, 5:00 p.m. - 7:00 p.m.
Artist talk at 6:00 p.m.
Reception is free to the public, free parking in UM-Dearborn lot.
Complimentary drinks and hors d'oeuvres provided.
G.B.F. (Giant Blue Flower),The Stamelos Gallery Center is proud to share Piece by Piece: Recent Work from Regional Fiber Artists with the campus and greater community.
This exhibition highlights the work of eleven local artists exploring the possibilities of fiber craft in fine art. The exhibiting artists, including Yeager Edwards, Taylor Jenkins, Shaina Kasztelan, Bella Kiser, Kit Parks, Kayla Powers, Jessie Rice, Leslie Rogers, Katie Shulman, Melissa Webb, and Maggie Wiebe, represent only a small snapshot of the fiber community and work being created in Metro Detroit.
Opening Reception
Thursday, May 16, 2024, 5:00 p.m. - 7:00 p.m.
Artist talk at 6:00 p.m.
Reception is free to the public, free parking in UM-Dearborn lot. Complimentary wine and hors d'oeuvres provided.
Clothes Pit Since You're Gone, Andy T.
Andy T's Urban Vision, 2001-2024 is the first mid-career retrospective of Detroit-based installation artist Andrew W. Thompson, popularly known as “Andy T.” As a sculptor, Thompson gives new life to discarded objects such as tires, grocery bags, plastic bottles, and mailing envelopes, thereby integrating questions of environmental, social, and economic sustainability into the context of art. Treating art as a “fundamental life-organizing principle,” the artist observes, researches, and interprets how everyday items circulate, shape, and express social beliefs and cultural customs. Over the past two decades, Kansas City and Detroit have stimulated an artistic investigation of sociocultural topics such as electoral mapping, fluctuations in money’s value, urban planning methods, waste management tactics, food sourcing policies, body image and clothing choices, and the effects of information storage on knowledge growth.
Opening Reception
Thursday, January 25, 2024, 5:00 p.m. - 7:00 p.m.
Artist Andrew W. Thompson will speak at 6:00 p.m.
Reception is free to the public. Complimentary beverages and hors d'oeuvres provided.
Exhibition Event
Thursday, March 21, 2024, 5:00 p.m. - 7:00 p.m.,
Mardigian Library, University of Michigan-Dearborn.
Help complete the collaborative flag Home of the Brave! Bring in a small personal item of choice that shows how participating in a local community brings you strength.
Kristin Anahit Cass is a Chicago-based artist working in photography, video, writing, sculpture and other media. Her art explores the intensely personal spaces where our lives intersect, considering underlying questions of social justice and human rights. As an artist of mixed ethnicity and a descendent of genocide survivors, Cass's work reflects her passion for amplifying diverse voices telling stories that inspire change. In addition to her arts education, her career as a lawyer gives her a unique perspective on the injustices that so many people and communities face every day. Cass is a graduate of the University of Chicago.
The New Freedom Fighters: Women And Nonviolent Resistance project explores the often unrecognized role that women play in the survival and evolution of cultures and communities. The women profiled in this project live every day under military threat and use different types of nonviolent resistance to defend their human rights and mitigate the consequences of war in their communities. The lives of the women you meet here have been irrevocably shaped by war. Despite feeling the effects of the violence on their homes, families, career prospects, and communities, these women understand the need for creative nonviolence to break the cycle of war and intolerance.
Borderlands Under Fire exposes the world of a frozen conflict and documents the effects of state-sponsored violence on daily life in the frontier villages of Armenia, a tiny country in the South Caucasus. Caught at the geopolitical crossroads of East and West, Armenian villagers find themselves used as pawns in a political power game, and ignored by international organizations like the OSCE and the UN. But they refuse to give up their agency, and they continue working to make change from within their communities. Even as the people of these border villages suffer violence and privation daily as a result of war, they hold fast to their homeland, preserving their language and culture as part of the world's heritage. The project explores the villagers' use of creative nonviolent resistance to defend their human rights and develop their communities.
And the
prize-winning
photos are...
Laura Cavanagh Exhibition
(Title TBD)
Nanci Einstein Exhibition
(Title TBD)
Student Curated Exhibition
Michelle Sider exhibition
Anita Bates exhibition
Denise Willing Booher exhibition
The Stamelos Gallery Center is located on the first floor of the Mardigian Library at the University of Michigan-Dearborn. For more information, see below for contact information. Anyone requiring accommodations under the provisions of the Americans with Disabilities Act should contact (313)593-5087.
Taketori Tale,
Kyohei Fujita (b. 1921),
n.d.,
Mold blown glass with gold and silver foil inclusions
Gift of Richard and Louise Abrahams,
Collection of UM-Dearborn (Adp39),
Photograph by Kip Kriigel
World renowned artist Kyohei Fujita was born in Japan in 1921. He is known as the father of Japanese studio glass. Many of his works, including this one, were inspired by early Japanese boxes that were richly decorated with lacquerwork and mother-of-pearl inlays, and traditionally used to store Buddhist writings, jewelry, inkstones and brushes. Fujita's celebrated ornamental glass boxes revive conventional Japanese aesthetics in a contemporary form. This breathtaking piece was mold blown with gold and silver foil inclusions. Whenever asked by collectors what to keep in the boxes, the artist usually stated "You should put your dreams in them."
---Laura Cotton, Art Curator and Gallery Manager
