Summer window closes with gallery talk

Summer window closes with gallery talk

BY JESSICA STARK
Rice News Staff

While other campus spaces had some downtime this summer, Rice Gallery was busy with its summer window exhibit “When the Animals Rebel.” The installation’s Los Angeles-based artist, Mike Stilkey, will give a talk at noon Aug. 30 at the Rice Gallery. A complimentary light lunch will be served. The event is free and open to the public.

PHOTOS BY NASH BAKER

Artist Mike Stilkey will give a talk at noon Aug. 30 at the Rice Gallery on his installation “When the Animals Rebel.”

To create the installation, Stilkey painted on the spines and covers of thousands of books stacked against the 16-by-44-foot wall.

“I see shape and lives in books and there’s something magical about painting on them and breathing new stories into them,” Stilkey said. “I feel like my paintings can create a second life for the books.”

Stilkey was commissioned by Kimberly Davenport, director of Rice Gallery, after she saw one of his book sculptures at a gallery in Los Angeles. She was drawn by the combination of the “eccentric drawing style” and the “almost magical allure” of the old books.

“I wondered if the artist could expand the idea to a much larger scale, and as it turned out, this came easily for Mike,” Davenport said. “His installation, ‘When the Animals Rebel,’ surpassed my expectations and has been a show that people return to again and again. Our guest book is brimming with appreciative comments, and Mike has discovered a whole new direction for his work.”

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