Vivaria Particula

2010 MECA Faculty Exhibition

November 17, 2010 - January 9, 2011

Claude Caswell • Honour Mack • Letterscapes (Margo Halverson, Charles Melcher, Mark Jamra, Megan O’ Connell, and Melle Hammer)

The Institute of Contemporary Art at Maine College of Art (ICA at MECA) in Portland will present the exhibition Vivaria Particula from November 17, 2010 - January 9, 2011. An artist reception will be held on Thursday, November 18, from 5pm to 8 pm. ICA entrance, events and lectures are free and open to the public.

Vivaria Particula features the work of two individual artists and one collaborative of MECA faculty members who explore various notions of communication and language, as well as the non-verbal, intuitive functions of experience as a means to replace words. What unites this disparate grouping of practices is a mutual reverence for text, be it functional or conceptual. In Vivaria Particula the artists strive to confirm the meaning amongst the letters while warmly embracing the linguistic labyrinth.

Featured artists include Claude Caswell (Liberal Arts), Charles Melcher (Graphic Design), Mark Jamra (Graphic Design), Margo Halverson (Graphic Design), Megan O’ Connell (Art History) and Honour Mack (Painting). All are current faculty members of the BFA program at Maine College of Art. The exhibit also includes the work of Melle Hammer, a visiting artist in the Graphic Design department. Vivaria Particula is the fourth in MECA’ s series of juried thematic faculty exhibitions. This exhibition was juried by Portland Museum of Art curator Susan Danly, designer Janet Friskey, and visual artist and Bowdoin College Visual Arts Program Chair Mark Wethli.

Claude Caswell teaches writing at MECA. He is the recipient of the 1998 Winner of Seacoast Writing Association's First Prize for Nonfiction. His work, "Paris: City of Brothelly Love," is included in the book French Connections: Hemingway and Fitzgerald Abroad, published by St. Martin’ s Press.

Honour Mack received her MFA from Yale University School of Art and her Bachelor of Science from Skidmore College in New York. She has received fellowships to attend the Fine Arts Work Center in Massachusetts, the Vermont Studio Colony, and the Chautauqua Institution in New York. Professor Mack has exhibited her work at the Center for Maine Contemporary Art, The University of Southern Maine, University of Maine, and Colby College Museum of Art.

Letterscapes is a collaborative involving faculty members Margo Halverson, Charles Melcher and Mark Jamra of the Graphic Design department at MECA, Megan O’ Connell in Art History and visiting artist Melle Hammer.

Events

Free and open to the public.

Artists' Reception: Thursday, November 18, 5-8pm
First Friday Artwalk: December 3 and January 7

Poetry Readings

Student Reading
December 2, 11:30am

Claude Caswell Reading
January 7, 7:30pm

Artist Talks

Mark Jamra
Tuesday, November 23, 2pm

Writing and its Influence on Type Design

Margo Halverson
Tuesday, November 30, 6pm 
FROM SCRATCH: Children's writing, proto-writing, language and symbol

Honour Mack
Thursday, December 2, 3:30 pm

Charles Melcher
Thursday, December 2,  6pm
Proprioceptive Writing: a written meditation on thought flow, an introduction to this practice and invitation for anyone to take part

Megan O'Connell
Wednesday, December 8, 3:30pm 

Charles Melcher
Wednesday, January 5,  6pm
Proprioceptive Writing: a written meditation on thought flow, an introduction to this practice and invitation for anyone to take part