Mid April - Fullerton Observer

Page 14 FULLERTON OBSERVER EVENTS MID APRIL 2013
‘Radical Retrospective’ G. Ray Kerciu’s Art
On Display in Begovich Gallery, CSUF
by Mimi Ko Cruz
When the U.S. Supreme Court ruled
that James Meredith was legally entitled
to attend the University of Mississippi in
1962, the arrival of the first African-
American student at the segregated school
sparked a significant flash point in the
civil rights movement. At the same time, a
young newly appointed art instructor at
Ole Miss, G. Ray Kerciu, used his oversized
canvases to capture the rioting that
engulfed the campus as Federal marshals
faced off against militant segregationists.
Fullerton Friends of Music Free Concert Series
Presents the Bennewitz Quartet
Fullerton Friends of Music will present
the Bennewitz String Quartet in a program
of chamber music at 3pm, Sunday
April 21st at Sunny Hills High School
Performing Arts Center, Warburton Way
(off Bastanchury) in Fullerton. The program
will include works by Ravel,
Martinu, and Schuman. Admission is
free.
The Bennewitz Quartet, founded by
young musicians at the Academy of
Performing Arts in Prague in 1998, and
named after the famous Czech violinist
and teacher Antonin Bennewitz (1833-
1926), is today one of the leading Czech
chamber music ensembles.
A photo of Kerciu in front of “America
the Beautiful,” his oil painting of a graffiti-covered
Confederate flag, was featured
on the covers of newspapers and magazines,
including Time and Artnews. That
image and others in his 1963 Ole Miss
solo exhibition drew the ire of infuriated
segregationists and propelled Kerciu into
the national spotlight.
“I was only a reporter,” the 79-year-old
Laguna Beach resident recalled. “I just
recorded all that really nasty, nasty stuff. .
. . I just put it on canvas.”
His paintings were “really in-your-face,
tough kind of paintings that
brought down the house,”
Kerciu said in a recent oral history
interview, adding that he
was arrested and charged for
“desecrating the Confederate
flag.”
Kerciu’s supporters were
numerous and included luminaries
like Malcolm X, John
Steinbeck and Andy Warhol.
Months later, the charges
against Kerciu were dropped and
he joined the faculty at Cal State
Fullerton. For the next 39 years,
he championed multiple causes
on campus and in the larger
community. Kerciu, who founded
the university’s printmaking
area of study, was instrumental
in founding the Grand Central
Art Center in Santa Ana. He
retired in 2002.
At Left: Kerciu in shot from 50 years
ago with one of his Ole Miss paintings
for which he was arrested and
charged for “desecrating the
Confederate flag.”
In 2005 the Bennewitz Quartet was the
gold medal winner at the International
Chamber Music Competition in Osaka
which was followed by a tour of Japan. In
2008, the tenth anniversary of their
founding, the group was given the first
prize of the renowned Borciani competition
in Italy. The enthusiastically received
winner’s tour took the four string players
to the most important stages in Europe, to
the USA, and Japan, including performances
in Brussels, Hamburg, Bremen,
Stuttgart, Basel, Florence, Rome, New
York, Los Angeles, and Tokyo.
Besides its focused, balanced and richly
differentiated sound culture, its interest-
Today, the emeritus professor
of art, and curators Mike
McGee, professor of art, and
Concepción Rodríguez, art graduate
student, are presenting “G.
Ray Kerciu: Radical
Retrospective” in Begovich
Gallery on campus. Among the
artworks representing his career
are those 50-year-old paintings
capturing the uproar that roiled
that bastion of the Old South.
In his forward to the exhibition
catalogue, McGee writes:
“It is generally not in Kerciu’s
nature to be a passive observer.
In most of the places he has found himself,
he has been, at a minimum, an active
participant and, more often than not, in
the middle of things, stirring the pot and
rallying others to get involved.”
Kerciu said that when he was young and
idealistic he thought that “by 40, 50 years,
we won’t even be talking about race and n-
ing programming is also characteristic of
the quartet. Although it is still a young
ensemble, it has a broad repertoire from
Bach fugues to the classical canon to modern
works, and includes a long list of less-
Artist G. Ray Kerciu in his studio today.
words and about cultures that
are threatening the great
white population. I really
thought that it would be
over, but I was wrong. It’s not
over.”
The fight for social justice
continues, Kerciu stresses.
“When you see injustice,
you have to stand up and
fight,” he said. “There’s just
too much injustice in this
world, and my message to
young college students is that
they must fight for equality.
That’s the importance of
knowledge and wisdom.”
The exhibit is free and continues
through May 25 at the Begovich Gallery,
Cal State Fullerton, 800 N. State College
Blvd., Fullerton. Gallery hours are noon
to 4 p.m. Mon.-Thurs. and noon to 2
p.m. Saturday. For more information, call
657-278-2434.
“When you
see injustice,
you have to
stand up
and fight....
That’s the
importance
of knowledge
and wisdom.”
G. Ray Kerciu
The Bennewitz Quartet performs 3pm Sunday, April 21st at Sunny Hills.
er-known works - among them those of
Czech composers such as Olga Jezkova
and Slavomir Horinka.
For additional information call 714-
525-5836 or 7140-525-5310.