Contact: Melissa Reifert
January 12, 2007

Georgia Southern Professor Shows Frog Story at MECC

Where can you see an area art exhibit featuring mummified frogs and toads?  Only at Mountain Empire Community College, where Georgia Southern University (GSU) art professor Julie McGuire currently has her work on display in the Slemp Gallery.  The Frog Story is compiled of a number of mixed media presentations using frogs and other materials such as used books, fabric trim, stickers, dried flowers displayed in different boxes including cigar, ginseng tea, jewelry, and Plexiglas boxes.

McGuire, who holds a bachelor’s degree in fine art from Illinois College, a master’s degree in art history from the University of Arkansas at Little Rock, and a Ph.D. in art history from Indiana University, has taught a variety of courses on modern and contemporary art at GSU.  She has also published numerous articles and book reviews on a wide range of topics that include performance art, art and technology, and art and popular culture. 

Her mixed media installations and individual artworks have been exhibited in venues such as the Woman Made Gallery in Chicago, Illinois; the Ex Libris Gallery in Savannah, Georgia; and the Sharjah Art Museum in the United Arab Emirates.  McGuire says that she makes art in order to address the issues she faces as a human being in the world.

“By paying attention to life’s peculiarities and the nuances of human nature, I have found that there are many truths,” she states.  “For me, art is not only a source of self-knowledge, but also a vehicle for revealing these truths as they are filtered through my own experience.  By visually describing personal perspective, and then subsequently exhibiting my point of view to the public, I am asking the world to formulate their own opinion.”

The Frog Story will be on display at MECC until February 9.  The Slemp Gallery is open from 8 a.m. to 8:30 p.m. on Monday through Thursday, 8 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. on Friday, and 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. on Saturday. It is located in the Wampler Library of Robb Hall.      

“Miss Vivian” is part of artist Julie McGuire’s work featured in The Frog Story, an exhibit on display until February 9 in the Slemp Gallery at MECC.

Visitors to the Slemp Gallery at MECC can see “Plexi Coffin” until February 9.  The work is part of the exhibit, The Frog Story by artist Julie McGuire.

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