Date: August 11, 2011
Contact: Carol Connelly, Director, Media & Communication Services, ext. 5267, cconnelly@pnc.edu

PNC Presents "Illuminations & Explorations: Drawings of the Aurora Borealis

Artist Olivia Petrides

WESTVILLE – The Purdue University North Central Odyssey Arts and Cultural Events Series will present the exhibit "Illuminations & Explorations: Drawing of the Aurora Borealis" by Olivia Petrides from Sept. 2 to Dec. 24 in the f irst floor, north study area of the PNC Technology Building and it is free and open to the public.

Building hours are Monday through Friday, 7 a.m. to 11 p.m.; Saturday, 7 a.m. to 5 p.m. and Sunday, 1 to 5 p.m. during the school semester; otherwise the building is closed on Sunday.

Petrides explained, “In January 2007, I was an artist-in-residence at the Gil-society in Akureyri, Iceland, a town just below the Arctic Circle. I requested a winter residency specifically to see the aurora borealis, a continuously moving phenomenon caused by atmospheric gases interacting with solar particles. I translated the flux of the aurora into a language of discrete marks and fluid gestures. I built each drawing with layers of gouache and ink using brush and pen, subtracted with sandpaper and ink washes and reconstructed again. Like the aurora, each image is a provisional conclusion to an evolving process.”

She has had numerous exhibits in Iceland, the Faroe Islands, Scotland, Seattle, Washington, D.C. and Chicago. Her works are included in the public collections of the Smithsonian Institution, the U.S. Park Service, the Field Museum, the Illinois State Museum, Openlands Preservation Association and Iceland's Hafnarborg Institute of Art, among others.

Among her grants and residencies are a Fulbright Grant, American-Scandinavian Foundation Grants, an Illinois Arts Council Governor's Exchange Award and a City of Chicago Community Arts Assistance Program Grant. She was awarded residencies at the Rekjavik Municipal Museum and the Gil-society in Iceland; the Faroe Islands Museum of Natural History; the Virginia Center for the Creative Arts; the Vermont Studio Center; Yellowstone National Park; and the Ragdale Foundation.

Petrides earned an M.F.A. from the School of the Art Institute of Chicago, where she is an adjunct associate professor in the Painting & Drawing Department and the Visual Communications Department.

For information about this exhibit or the Odyssey Arts and Cultural Events Series, contact Judy Jacobi, PNC assistant vice chancellor of Marketing and Campus Relations, at 785-5200, ext. 5593. Persons with disabilities requiring accommodations should contact Jacobi.