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Second Annual Juried Art Exhibition, Juried by Artist Warren C. Dennis, Needs Submission for April Displays

Watauga Co. Arts Council logoMarch 9, 2012. Watauga Arts Council announces a call for entries for the 2nd Annual Juried Exhibition developed to allow regional artists to compete and display work at the Jones House Community Center main gallery during April 2012.

The call for entries is open to all artists 18 years and older who reside in Watauga or adjoining counties. Entries must be original works and created within the past two years. Works may be created in any medium, but must be two-dimensional in orientation and must not exceed 40 inches in any direction. Pieces must be framed or gallery wrap with hanging wires and ready to hang. No giclee or digital reproductions will be accepted. Entry deadline is Monday, March 19.

Download an entry form and prospectus from www.watauga-arts.org or send a SASE to Watauga Arts Council, PO Box 366 D.T.S. Boone, NC  28607. Warren Cameron Dennis will jury the exhibit.

Watauga Arts Council galleries are sponsored in part by Cheap Joe’s Art Stuff and Grassroots Funds of the North Carolina Arts Council. The WAC’s offices and galleries are located in downtown Boone at the Jones House Community & Cultural Center, owned by the town of Boone.

About Warren Cameron Dennis

Dennis was born in Clarksdale, Miss.  He received a B.A. degree in art from the University of Southern Mississippi in Hattiesburg in 1953.  In 1955 he received his Master of Fine Arts degree from the University of Mississippi in Oxford.  During the summer of 1950, he studied painting at the University of Minnesota in Duluth with renowned Japanese-American artist Yasuo Kuniyoshi.  While at the University of Mississippi he studied with visiting artists Jack Tworkov, painter, and David Smith, sculptor.

From 1955 to 1965 Professor Dennis was head of the Art Department at Judson College in Marion, Ala. He was appointed to Appalachian State University in 1965.  From 1980 through 1984 he served as chair of the Appalachian State Department of Art. He was one of the original developers of the Appalachian-New York Loft Program and was campus director of the NY-Loft for a number of years. In addition, he spent three separate semesters (in 1985, 1989, and 1993) and the summer term of 1982 in New York City as resident director of the loft.

In 1977-78 Dennis was awarded the first scholarly leave granted by the Department of Art. In the summer of 1985 and again in 1987, he organized and directed “Art in Europe,” Appalachian’s Study Abroad Program, designed to allow students to study the great art of Europe in such places as Florence, Rome, Venice, Paris and Amsterdam.

Dennis is an exhibiting artist whose paintings are in public and private collections all over the United States, including the Allan Stone Gallery in New York City, the Ogden Museum of Southern Art in New Orleans, the Mississippi Museum in Jackson and the Hickory Museum of Art in North Carolina. He has had two large one-person exhibits in Appalachian’s Catherine Smith Gallery: “A Thirty-Year Retrospective” in 1980 and “1980 Forward” in 1992. His solo exhibitions total well over fifty and he has participated in numerous group and competitive exhibits throughout the country.

Professor Dennis retired from Appalachian State University in January 1994, receiving the rank of professor emeritus at that time. He immediately began the full-time pursuit of his art career and has been busy painting and arranging exhibits. He spent one summer term in 2003 as resident director of the Appalachian House in Washington, D.C.

In 2002, Dennis was invited to show his painting “The Swing” in “True Colors: Meditations on the American Spirit,” an exhibition organized by the Meridian International Center, Washington, D.C., as a response by artists to the events of September 11, 2001. The show opened in February 2002, in Washington, and throughout the next three years it toured the United States and traveled abroad to such places as Berlin, Germany; Istanbul; Ankara, Turkey; Belfast, Northern Ireland; Bratislava, Slovakia and Tirana, Albania. 

Warren Dennis’ mural “The Park,” a 7’ x 18’ work on three panels, completed in 2001, now hangs in the Burke Mission Station in Morganton, N.C. — a gift of the artist and a permanent installation. Two North Carolina galleries currently represent him: Carlton Art Gallery in Banner Elk and New Elements Gallery in Wilmington.

Professor Dennis continues to live in Boone with his wife, Dr. Mary Kate Lowrey Dennis, who has retired from adjunct teaching in the Appalachian State English Department. They have four children: Anna Kathryn Sartin of Rock Hill, S.C.; Warren Cameron Dennis III of Winston-Salem, N.C.; Edwin Lowrey Dennis of Clyde, N.C. and Martha Rosamond Dennis of Athens, Ga.  They also have six grandchildren: Marianna Landon Sartin of Charlotte; Kathryn Nell Sartin of London, England; Ian Cameron and Max Harrison Dennis of Winston-Salem, N.C. and Andrew Stovall and Michael Perrin Dennis of Clyde, N.C. 

During the fall of 2009 the Town of Boone received a very special gift from Professor Dennis. Dennis donated a large painting entitled “Town of Boone, North Carolina.” This very large oil painting depicts downtown Boone and City Hall from the unique vantage point of ASU’s Farthing Auditorium. With an artist’s liberties, Dennis eliminated many of the physical barriers which block the view of downtown from the auditorium. 

Boone Mayor Loretta Clawson sought the advice and assistance of Cherry Johnson, Executive Director of the Watauga County Arts Council in determining an appropriate location in which to hang this beautiful gift. Together the two came up with the idea of hanging the painting in the Boone Town Council Chambers on Blowing Rock Road, which, as Mayor Clawson says, is one of the most frequently used facilities in the town. From this came the concept of hanging “Art in the Chambers” as a way of both beautifying the Town Council Chambers while also showcasing one of Boone’s best assets — its artistic community.  

Initially six other Boone artists were invited to help launch the project by loaning a painting or drawing for a few months. Paintings by some of the area’s finest artists. Louise Harris, Orna Bentor, Holly Soukup and a graphite sketch by Noyes Capehart shared the wall with Warren Dennis’ painting for these first few months. Following the initial exhibit the Arts Council and the Town of Boone partnered again to host a juried competition to celebrate the Blue Ridge Parkway’s 75th exhibit. Most recently the Art in the Chambers program has featured the artwork of celebrated local artist, Joe Miller, which is currently on display along with Warren Dennis’ painting.