The Crimson White Print Edition - January 18, 2024

2B
culture
UA art professors:
Educators by day, astounding creators by night
Luke McClinton
Staff Writer
Visual art is home to
a range of voices,
a wide and everexpanding
cache of
unique perspectives. It
allows a colorful — or,
sometimes, literally
black and white — blend
of creativity, emotional
expression and
even advocacy.
Artists make
up an elusive and
seemingly endless
category. As if the
array of perspectives,
personalities and
positions weren’t
extensive enough,
however, at The
University of
Alabama, there is a
doubling down of this
extensiveness.
When asked to
describe an artist,
one could give any
among a slew of
answers — world-class
painters with works in
museums, hawkeyed
photographers who
spend every waking
hour capturing the
world, perhaps even the
barista trying to pay off
student loans by selling
modernist caricatures.
A less likely response
would be professors.
The idea of a
university professor as
an artist is fascinating.
Whether consciously or
unconsciously, we often
put these educators in a
box. Most end up placed
somewhere along the
spectrum from adjuncts
who spend their time
dashing between
classrooms and grading
freshman essays to
long-tenured experts
who are always teaching
a 500-level seminar or
doing rigorous academic
research.
With art professors,
there’s a different
dynamic. They
don’t operate in the
stratosphere of rigidity
and analytics; they
have emboldened
visions and youthful
artistic ambitions.
These educators by day,
so to speak, represent
the part of the faculty
who have made their
creative endeavors their
carrer. It is a way of
expressing one’s own
and observing others’
distinct outlooks on life.
For Jason Guynes,
professor of art and
chair of the Department
of Art and Art History,
“the opportunity to
view the world through
someone else’s eyes
for a moment is often
what’s so interesting
in art in general.” This
is an enlightening
perspective; it allows
one to throw off the
notions of art as an
innocent whim of
youth or as wishful
escapism for adults
and let it simply
exist as a medium for
perspectives.
Once these narrow
ideas are left behind, all
that’s left is to absorb
these perspectives,
acknowledging that a
college professor is at
least as capable — and
arguably more — of
offering intriguing and
valuable worldviews as
any other artist.
The offerings are
limitless. When asked
about their work,
specifically those they
will be showcasing in
the Department of Art
and Art History Faculty
Biennial Exhibition
until Feb. 12, several
professors gave several
notable and singular
responses.
“My own work can be
described as geometric
abstraction produced
both in painting and
drawing form,” associate
art professor William
Dooley wrote. “I am not
sure if this is a category
but it does describe
the work.”
Associate professor
of art and painting
Bryce Speed wrote,
“I use an interplay of
universal shapes on
simple grounds to evoke
palpable experiences of
the horizon, language,
and architectural
spaces.”
Guynes’ artist
statement intimates
his desire to “narrate
the human condition”
through personal
experience as well
as a fascination with
what is referred to
as “unrealism.” That
latter aspect draws him
toward “those elements
that are so strongly a
part of a narrative, but
that aren’t obviously or
visibly apparent.”
Assistant professor
of art and art history
Jamey Grimes “love[s]
experiencing the beauty
of the outside world,”
a love that inspires
sculptures utilizing
“synthetic materials
that interact in some
way with light and
shadow.”
These are just a few
excerpts among the rich
and ceaseless cascade
of artistic perspectives
held by UA professors.
Whether they are
straightforward or
incomprehensible to
all but the mind of the
beholder, they reveal an
authentic spirit of art.
It isn’t exceptional
that a professor should
offer a captivating
perspective. After
all, they have the
opportunity that the
debt-racked barista
doesn’t, which is to
explore their most
unorthodox and outthere
ideas without
the pressure of those
ideas providing their
living. They don’t have
to cater to audiences
but, as Grimes wrote,
“experiment freely
with [their] artistic
expression.”
These professors
are employed to teach
their craft. As such,
with the practice of the
craft itself, they are at
complete liberty, free to
go where their creative
spirits take them; given
the brilliance that got
them to professorship
in the first place,
the destinations are
undoubtedly worth
it. They flourish, and
the Tuscaloosa and
University of Alabama
art scene is better for it.
More information
on the Department of
Art and Art History's
professors and faculty
arts can be found at art.
ua.edu.
“Tower Loan,” Bryce Speed
“Vending Machine,” Bryce Speed
“Father and Daughter 1,” Jason Guynes
These paintings, and more, will be available for viewing at the 2024 UA Department of Art and Art History Faculty Biennial Exhibition at the Sarah Moody Gallery of Art.