Campus News Society & Culture

Georgia Museum of Art to host lecture by Icelandic sculptor Steinunn Thorarinsdottir

Athens, Ga. – The Georgia Museum of Art will present an artist’s talk with Icelandic sculptor Steinunn Thórarinsdóttir, in celebration of Women’s History Month on March 29, from 5:30 to 7 p.m. in the M. Smith Griffith Auditorium. Thórarinsdóttir will discuss her installation Horizons, currently on view in the Jane and Harry Willson Sculpture Garden at the GMOA.

Horizons features 12 androgynous, life-sized cast-iron figures, each posed differently and all bearing a polished glass band across the chest. The exhibition debuted in early 2007 at the Katonah Museum in New York, and has traveled to six different locations over the past four years. For the GMOA’s reopening this January, Horizons was chosen to inaugurate the Jane and Harry Willson Sculpture Garden, dedicated to female sculptors. The exhibition, on view through June, has proven a favorite among museum visitors, who enjoy posing with the sculptures as well as contemplating them.

An online photo gallery has been started on the museum’s Flickr site and is accessible at http://www.flickr.com/photos/gmoa/sets/72157625929937469/. Visitors are encouraged to submit their photos of the Horizons exhibition to gmoapr@yahoo.com.

“[The figures] sometimes seem to communicate with each other and at other times are striking in their isolation, but in each case, they make the viewer a part of their conversation,” said Lynn Boland, GMOA’s Pierre Daura Curator of European Art.

Thórarinsdóttir has been working professionally for more than 30 years and has exhibited widely in Europe, Japan and Australia. She received her training at the Portsmouth Academy of Art and Design in England and the Accademia di Belle Arte in Bologna, Italy. She currently lives and works in her native Reykjavik, Iceland.

This lecture, as part of the museum’s grand reopening celebration, is sponsored by the UGA Office of the Vice President for External Affairs.

Museum Information

Partial support for the exhibitions and programs at the Georgia Museum of Art is provided by the Georgia Council for the Arts through appropriations of the Georgia General Assembly. The council is a partner agency of the National Endowment for the Arts. Individuals, foundations and corporations provide additional museum support through their gifts to the Arch Foundation and the University of Georgia Foundation. The Georgia Museum of Art is located in the Performing and Visual Arts Complex on the East Campus of the University of Georgia. The address is 90 Carlton Street, University of Georgia, Athens, Ga. 30602-6719. For more information, including hours, see www.georgiamuseum.org or call 706/542-4662.