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Feb 17
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In Honor of Black History Month

By News
More than half a century ago, the Makonde tribe sculpted and created beautiful artifacts that were used as communication tools, to improve fishing and hunting skills, and to ward of illnesses. Today, those same artifacts are displayed at the Turner Center for the Arts where anyone can come and observe them free of charge. Read More

Feb 05
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Saluting Country Royalty

By News

Broadway Stars and Presenter Series committee members were seen rubbing shoulders with stars Patsy Cline and Hank Williams after “Country Royalty – A Salute to Hank Williams and Patsy Cline” at Mathis Auditorium! Get your tickets now for “JERSEY BOYS,” Thurs., Mar. 12 at 7:30 p.m., which is the last show in the 2019-2020 Presenter Series season. For more information and to purchase tickets, visit turnercenter.org.

Pictured, first row, l-r: Sementha Mathews, Mala Vallotton, Jennifer Powell, Jane Burgsteiner, Linda Grondahl, Gail Bliss as “Patsy Cline,” Jane McLane, Jeani Synyard, Sherrill and Steven Lahr; second row, l-r: Mike Shobe, Tina and Brad Folsom, Cheryl Oliver, Nancy D. Warren, Billy Grondahl, Jason Petty as “Hank Williams,” H. Arthur McLane, Gail and Walter Hobgood.

Not pictured are: Millie Adams, Stephanie Blevins, Dean Brooks, Roy and Cheryl Copeland, Susan Dukes, Mary and Tom Gooding, Lucy Greene, Richard Hill, Peter and Happy Ingeman, Sara and Ed Lamb, Sally Turner Querin, Chuck Ramsey, Cindy Tolbert, Patricia Vigerstol, Evelyn and Steven Walker, Susan and Butch Wiggins, Clarence and Eddie Wiggs, and James Willis.

Jan 14
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Turner Center Hosts William Rawlings, Feb. 4

By News

The Turner Center for the Arts will host Georgia author William Rawlings, Jr. for a book signing on Feb. 4, 2020, from 4-6 p.m.

Rawlings, a semi-retired internal medicine physician and the author of 10 novels, will review one of his latest books, “Girl with the Kaleidoscope Eyes,” which was released in fall 2019. His newest book “Six Inches Deeper—the Disappearance of Hellen Hanks” is scheduled to be released in spring 2020 and is the true-crime account of a murder that took place in South Georgia in 1972. Rawlings will give a preview of his latest book at the Feb. 4 book signing, along with a discussion about his life and work as an author.

After spending most of his life practicing medicine, Rawlings began fiction writing relatively late in life. His first novel, the thriller “The Lazard Legacy,” was published in 2003 when he was age 55. Set in a small Georgia town much like his hometown of Sandersville, it involves a doctor escaping big-city life only to stumble onto a nightmarish secret. Other books that followed include, “The Rutherford Cipher,” “The Tate Revenge” (winner of the Golden Eye Award), “Crossword” and “The Mile High Club.”

This event is free and open to the public. For more information about the author, visit www.williamrawlings.com. For additional information about the event, visit www.turnercenter.org or call 229-247-2787.

Jan 14
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Turner Center Presents New Gallery Collections

By News

The Annette Howell Turner Center for the Arts’ Gallery Opening Reception on Monday, Jan. 13 featured the 13th annual DrawProject fundraiser and VSU President Dr. Richard Carvajal as the guest auctioneer. Artworks donated by area artists were auctioned at this annual event to raise scholarship funds for VSU art students that are awarded in the fall semester.

The gallery event also features the fine art works of local artists Mary VanLandingham and Christine Cabral in the Price-Campbell and Josette’s Galleries respectively. Both are VSU alumni and are enjoying their first solo gallery shows at the Turner Center.

VanLandingham’s exhibit consists of oil paintings of landscapes found in the South East United States, primarily Georgia and Florida, capturing the familiarity and beauty of the southern coast and countryside. VanLandingham’s artwork will showcase a variety of entrancing scenes of water, land and sky.

Cabral’s inspired art work features acrylic paint on canvas, while occasionally incorporating mixed media fabrics and vinyl into her paintings. Upon losing her mother in 1997, the natural evolution of grief and emotion transformed Cabral’s expression. Driven by the notion that the desire to connect and revisit one’s childhood is universal, Cabral transforms her canvas with childlike and innocent imagery touched also by the heartache of grief and separation.

“The Turner Center for the Arts is proud to participate in the annual DrawProject exhibit and in our longstanding relationship with VSU’s Department of Art and Design,” said Executive Director Sementha Mathews. “This exciting art event adds a distinctive dimension to our winter gallery reception with silent and live auctions, providing all of us with an opportunity to obtain excellent, original art at affordable prices, while also celebrating our exceptional local artists.”

The Turner Center’s East African Art and Fine European Porcelain permanent collections are also on display in the Tillman and Howard Galleries.

All exhibits will remain open for the public’s enjoyment through Wednesday, Feb. 26. For more information, call 229-247-2787 or visit www.turnercenter.org.

Nov 18
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PAAC meets November 21, 2019

By Blog

The Valdosta Public Art Advisory Committee (PAAC) will meet on Thurs., Nov. 21, 2019 at 11:30 a.m. The regularly-scheduled meeting will take place in the second-floor board room of the Annette Howell Turner Center for the Arts, located at 527 N. Patterson Street. Read More

Nov 01
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Turner Center Presents New Gallery Collections

By Blog

Three new exhibits were unveiled during a free, public reception Monday evening at the arts center.

The Turner Center for the Arts presented the fine arts collections of Natalie Andreeva, Inside Out: Celebrating Women in Art, and the RAC (Regional Artists Community) inaugural group exhibit, as well as the literary works of author Steve McCurdy, in a free Gallery Opening Reception on Monday, Nov. 4, from 5-7 p.m. Read More

Oct 24
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Turner Center Cuts Ribbon on City’s First Art Park

By Blog

Celebration held at 2nd Annual ARToberfest, Oct. 26

Local artists and their works are featured at ARToberfest 2019, this Saturday, October 26, from 9 a.m. to 4 p.m. The annual event will be held at the newly-created Turner Center Art Park, located at 605 N. Patterson Street, Valdosta. Valdosta Mayor John Gayle, along with Turner Center board members, staff and park sponsors, will cut the ribbon at 10 a.m., at the Art Park Pavilion, located in the center of the park. Read More

Sep 17
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PAAC Meets Sept. 19

By Blog

The Valdosta Public Art Advisory Committee (PAAC) will meet on Thursday, Sept. 19, 2019 at 11:30 a.m. The regularly-scheduled meeting will take place in the second-floor board room of the Annette Howell Turner Center for the Arts, located at 527 N. Patterson Street.

The purpose of PAAC is to further the purchase, creation and appreciation of public art for its aesthetic value to the community. The PAAC also encourages the preservation and protection of works of public art which play a vital role in the economic development of the community.

For more information about the PAAC, call 229-247-2787.

Sep 12
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Turner Center Offers Cultural Hula Dance

By Blog

Turner Center Offers Cultural Hula Dance

As part of its cultural enrichment focus, the Turner Center for the Arts will offer Hawaiian Hula as part of its class offerings, beginning in October 2019. The dance instruction, which will be held in the art galleries at 527 N. Patterson Street on Tuesdays from 6-7 p.m., will cost $50 for four weeks of instruction.

“Cultural enrichment is built into our mission statement, so we are proud to expand our art classes to include introductory Hawaiian Hula, beginning in October,” said Executive Director Sementha Mathews. “We anticipate these classes to not only shed light on the Hawaiian culture, but to also provide hours of fun for family and friends to make some great memories together.”

Instructor Jan Gochenouer has taught Hula and other forms of Polynesian dance for over a decade. A native of Hawaii, Gochenouer moved to Valdosta from Hawaii in 1995. She began dancing Hula at age 10 and performed as a professional Polynesian dancer for six years.

Each month, Gochenouer’s students will learn the hand and feet dance movements to a particular Hawaiian song. By the end of four lessons, students will have learned the entire song and dance coordination. Gochenouer has planned to start the classes in October with the Hawaiian song, “Little Brown Gal”—a song that she taught to a North Florida beauty pageant contestant who went on to win her contest.

Gochenouer said she wants to bring the spirit of “aloha” to South Georgia. The first set of Hula lessons will take place on Oct. 1, 8, 15 and 22. Three addition sessions are on the Turner Center’s schedule for November 2019 and in February and March of 2020.

For more information or to register for the Hula classes, call the Turner Center at 229-247-2787 or visit www.turnercenter.org.

Sep 11
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FREE Gallery Opening Reception Sept 16

By Blog

Featured artists are from Valdosta and Jacksonville

The Turner Center for the Arts will host the fine arts collections of Sean Hurley, Kristy Hughes, Jenny Hager & D. Lance Vickery, as well as the literary works of author Cheryl Carvajal, in a free Gallery Opening Reception on Monday, Sept. 16, from 5-7 p.m. The event will take place at the Turner Center galleries, located at 527 N. Patterson Street.

This gallery opening is unique in that it features two married couples extremely talented in their specialties.

Hurley and Hughes are members of the art faculty at Valdosta State University.

Hurley is an illustrator and print maker, whose drawings and prints examine the world with an unwavering eye for certainty and detail. Hurley’s work is well known among printmakers especially throughout the northeast, and they can be found in dozens of private collections as well as the collections of the Boston Athenaeum, the University of New Hampshire Museum of Art, and the Ogunquit Museum of American Art. His work is regularly exhibited in New York by Ebo Gallery and at The Old Print Shop, and in Portsmouth, New Hampshire, at Piscataqua Fine Arts.

Hughes is an abstract expressionist mixed-media artist who creates colorful collaged paintings about the human experience of knowing and not knowing. In her work, Hughes navigates between the contradictions of internal and external experience, paying attention to moments of simultaneity. Her work has been shown across the US, at venues in Brooklyn, Atlanta, San Francisco, and Indianapolis and has been published in Friend of the Artist, Burnaway, Cut Me Up Magazine, Execute Magazine, among others.

Vickery and Hager teach sculpture at the University of North Florida.

Vickery’s work balances between formalist sculpture and aesthetics and conceptual considerations of materials. He utilizes the tension between interiority and exteriority, both metaphorically and physically, in his works. These ideas manifest themselves in the process, materials and concepts. The pieces are rich in surface, texture and color, while visceral and physical in the process by which they were created.

Hager is a mixed-media and installation artist, whose artwork “Wings” was publicly displayed in Smith Park, in Valdosta, for the past year. Hager is interested in a variety of processes and materials, and finds inspiration in dreams, objects from her childhood, gadgets, sea life and other curiosities. She is also very interested in collaboration; the spirit of community is important in both her teaching practice and in her own work. Hager’s work has been exhibited across the country and recently in the Cymru Ironstone Castle Exhibition in Wales, the Pedvale Open-Air Art Museum in Latvia and Il Giardino di Daniel Spoerri in Seggiano, Italy. Hager created Sculpture Walk and UNF Seaside Sculpture Park, both in Jacksonville, Fla.; and she and Vickery created a sculpture on the Campus Program at UNF, among other projects.

Most Turner Center Gallery Opening Receptions also feature local authors and book-signing opportunities. The Sept. 16 reception is no exception and will feature the writings of Cheryl Carvajal, English teacher at Wiregrass Georgia Technical College and wife of Valdosta State University President Richard Carvajal. Her books are available for purchase on the night of the event and are also available in the Turner Center Gift Shop. At the event, Carvajal will help the Turner Center launch a new writing program for youth called, Young Writers League, that will be led by Carvajal on Saturday mornings at the center, beginning on Oct. 12.

The East African Artifacts and the Fine European Porcelain collections—both permanent collections of the Turner Center—will be displayed in the Tillman and Howard Galleries respectively at the event.

“The Turner Center is proud to host and support the inspired works of these local artists at the free Sept. 16 Gallery Opening Reception,” said Executive Director Sementha Mathews. “Free admission to the Turner Center is made possible by the continued generous support of local members and donors. We invite the public to experience the fine art displayed at this community event, while using the opportunity to also become more familiar with everything your arts center has to offer for patrons of all ages.”

The gallery offerings will remain on display through Oct. 30 at the Turner Center. For more information on the upcoming Gallery Opening Reception or other services offered by the Turner Center for the Arts, call 229-247-2787 or visit www.turnercenter.org.