December First Friday | William Downs

Name: December First Friday | William Downs
Start: 2024-12-06T17:00:00-05:00
End: 2024-12-06T21:00:00-05:00
Location: UT Downtown Gallery

Schedule

Fri Dec 06 2024 at 05:00 pm to 09:00 pm

UTC-05:00

Location

UT Downtown Gallery | Knoxville, TN

William Downs' artwork explores themes of ambiguity and distortion viewed through repetition and representation of the human body. His drawings reveal "feelings of anxiety, fear, joy, angst" or desire with compositions inspired by Cezanne that appear dream-like or otherworldly. He often depicts "people who train their bodies to do inhuman things like run a marathon or bend and contort their bodies," in surreal-like, panoramic scenes. Multiple figures are layered with warped perspective, creating contrasting areas of compositional ambiguity and sharp focus.
He received a BFA in Painting and Printmaking from the Atlanta College of Art and Design and a multidisciplinary MFA from the Mount Royal School of Art at the Maryland Institute College of Art. His awards include Artadia, The Working Artist Project at Museum of Contemporary Art GA, and The Nellie Mae Rowe Fellowship at Hambidge Creative Residency Program. His work has been included in national shows with Art AIDS America and Black Pulp! curated by Mark Thomas Gibson and William Villalongo. Downs has exhibited at venues nationally and abroad including: Contemporary Art Museum St. Louis, MO; Zuckerman Museum of Art, Kennesaw, GA; Slag Gallery, NYC; International Print Center, NYC; The Contemporary Art Museum at the University of South Florida, Tampa; the African American Museum, Philadelphia, PA; Abroms-Engel Institute for the Visual Arts at the University of Alabama, Birmingham; the Century Gallery in London; and Derek Eller Gallery, NYC. His work is held in collections such as The High Museum of Art, Atlanta, GA; The Birmingham Museum of Art, AL; and The Smithsonian Museum of Art, Washington, D.C.
Down's exhibition is sponsored by the School of Art Programming Committee, SouthArts, the National Endowment for the Arts, the Arts & Culture Alliance, Knox County, and the Department of the Treasury.