Sara Truman is a 2007 graduate of the WKU Department of Art, and holds a double BFA in ceramics and painting.  Having completed artistic residencies in clay and post-baccalaureate studies at the University of Florida, she is currently working towards her MFA degree in Ceramics at the University of Mississippi.  Her work will be on exhibit in the 3D Corridor Gallery until March 16 with a closing reception on March 18 in conjunction with the Bowling Green Gallery Hop.

Ms. Truman’s work combines elements from her background in painting with her ceramic objects.  Focusing on color, line, brushwork, and image, her installation pieces exhibited at WKU develop a visual personal narrative.

Using her own family photos as reference, Sara Truman establishes an abstraction of imagery as an index to memory and loss.  She presents images of children, trains, animals, and families on small plates mounted on the wall.  A functional object and functional image are rendered dis-functional by their over-abstraction or by their incongruous installation method.  The viewer is invited to dig through the artist’s many layers of glazes, slips and decal imagery, to focus on the repeated simple shapes and repeated abstracted images.  We begin to piece together Ms. Truman’s story. 

This story is at once both a narrative of the individual and of society as a collective whole.  In her role as a parent, Ms. Truman’s experiences are shared by many.  As a gay woman in the South, her experiences are shared by some.  As a parent who has experienced loss, her experiences are shared by few.  But as a gay parent in the south who has lost a child because of her sexuality, her experiences are borne nearly alone.  This exhibition is, in part, her method of exorcising that loss.

Sara Truman’s exhibition is sponsored by the Department of Art Galleries and the student-run WKU Clay Club.  The exhibition is entitled Family Valentine and runs Feb. 14 – March 16, 2011 in the 3D Corridor Gallery, 2nd Floor Ivan Wilson FAC.  A Closing Reception will be held Friday, March 18; 5 – 8 pm in conjunction with the Bowling Green Gallery Hop