Everson Museum opens exhibition of work by VPA faculty member and alumna Anne Cofer Feb. 7

Everson Museum opens exhibition of work by VPA faculty member and alumna Anne Cofer Feb. 7January 23, 2009SU News ServicesSUnews@syr.edu

The Everson Museum of Art will present the exhibition “Anne Cofer: Concealed Objects” by Anne Cofer G’05, winner of the Best-of-Show Award in the 2008 Everson Biennial and a faculty member in Syracuse University’s College of Visual and Performing Arts (VPA), Feb. 7-April 26 at the museum, 401 Harrison St., Syracuse.

An opening night lecture by Cofer and a reception will be held Friday, Feb. 6, at 5:30 p.m. The lecture and reception are free for Everson members and $10 for non-members.

“By successfully using unfired clay in new and exciting ways, Cofer has transcended the boundaries of what has been acceptable in traditional ceramic practice within the academic world,” says Debora Ryan, the Everson’s senior curator.

Cofer is a faculty member in the fiber arts/material studies program in VPA’s School of Art and Design. Her interest in materials and artistic processes is evident in “Concealed Objects,” a provocative new site-specific installation created for her first solo museum exhibition at the Everson. She creates objects that exist for a moment and place in time and are then recycled and reused for other projects.

The installation designed for the Everson is composed of skirt forms constructed of cloth and wet clay suspended from the ceiling in grid fashion. The skirts, arranged in perfect harmony within the space that contains them, appear to float in contradiction to the heavy clay that pulls them downward. Each garment is cut from a Victorian-era dress pattern (ca. 1895) combined with wet clay and modeled by hand to capture every fold of the fabric as it cascades to the floor. The repetition of form and motion recalls the monotonous tasks of domestic chores that have existed for centuries without change. Cofer assigns new meaning to the found and recycled fabrics she chooses for the garments: the bed linens, table cloths, furniture upholstery and well-worn clothing conceal the individual histories, memories and stories untold about their previous owners.

Cofer, who received an M.F.A. in fiber arts from VPA in 2005, took first prize at the 2005 National Council for Education in the Ceramic Arts (NCECA) student exhibition for “Daily Toil,” a series of 40 unfired clay slabs draped in muslin and suspended over wire.

Cofer’s exhibition is made possible in part by Clayscapes Pottery Inc.

The Everson is open to the public Tuesday-Friday and Sunday, noon-5 p.m., and Saturday, 10 a.m.-5 p.m. Admission is free with a suggested donation of $5 per person. For more information, visit http://www.everson.org.