Who: Amanda Knowles
She received her undergraduate degree from the University of Pennsylvania in printmaking and her masters in printmaking from the University of Wisconsin. Currently, she is a lecturer in printmaking and drawing at North Seattle Community College.
What: “Underpinnings” Amanda Knowles Art Exhibit/Art lecture
When: September 14, 2010
Where: Bryan Oliver Gallery at Whitworth University –
In keeping with Whitworth's mission, the art department strives to develop in its students an awareness and appreciation of God's world. Professionally active faculty members whose works have won awards at exhibits and juried competitions throughout the nation encourage students to participate in art to enhance their life experiences, to develop skills and concepts through theory and practice, and to immerse themselves intellectually and spiritually.
Why: This event follows Whitworth University Art Department’s mission to encourage students to participate in art and enhance their life experiences.
Amanda Knowles primarily does prints, but she also mixes in a little mixed media and sculpture. Her work has a common theme of scientific figures/shapes, and she incorporates them in different ways throughout her pieces. Knowles started using these shapes due to the influence of her parents. Both of them are scientists, and she grew up looking at the vast amount of scientific figures/designs in their textbooks. Her intent with her images is to take the scientific figures/shapes out of their normal context and reassemble them in interesting ways; this allows for a sense of imagery and allows the viewer to make their own interpretations of the figures/shapes.
For instance, her Pitch series does exactly this. These three pieces shown in her show, Underpinnings, are mixed media on paper. With these she incorporated photography and print. In the background of each of these pieces there is a photo she took of the silhouette of a ferries wheel. Then on top of the silhouettes, she layers her scientific figure/shape that look like a metal donut, similar in shape to the ferries wheel. The pieces are attractive because of the way she juxtaposed the photo with the different layers of the donut shape, printed and/or drawn on. Unfortunately, when she talked about these pieces in her lecture she never really had a specific meaning behind them, only that she thought they looked cool. She prefers to let the viewer come up with their own context.
By showing at Whitworth University’s Bryan Oliver gallery, it allows the northern Spokane community to view her masterful printmaking abilities. The Bryan Oliver gallery has not shown printmakers from outside the Spokane community in the recent years, thus this is a refreshing change. Whitworth’s art department does offer courses in printmaking, and now the students can see an accomplished printmaker, other than their own professor Scott Kolbo. We have seen many of Kolbo’s pieces over the years, but unlike Kolbo, Knowles doesn’t use the human figure in her pieces. Her main subject matter is her unique designs of a specific scientific figure/shape, whereas, Kolbo’s work often tells a story of a person. Also, Kolbo mainly sticks to the gray scale, but Knowles enjoys experimenting with different color palettes in each of her pieces.
Overall I enjoyed her show, but I did wish to hear about a little more meaning behind her images when she gave her art lecture. I was disappointed when I found that she doesn’t really have any specific meanings behind her images, only that she finds scientific figures/shapes and reassembles them so the viewer could make their own interpretations. In fact, all her lecture consisted of was her expressing her fascination with the images she had created, often pausing just to gasp at her own work. Even though, her work is really pleasant to look at, especially because of the way she assembled all the scientific figures/shapes shapes, which she described as “wonkey.” But it does make me wonder if her work might be more significant if she actually researched what the figures/shapes meant and purposely composed her images around their purposes…
2 comments:
I actually had the chance to get to meet Amanda in person and she is awesome. She came into my printmaking class and showed us a variety of her work. She showed us stuff she is currently working on and she allowed us to get a first hand look at her process for creating her stunning pieces. I agree with you that it would be cool if her work did have a greater intention or subtle meaning behind it, but after talking with her you realize that her goal is simply to put formal elements together in a way that are pleasing to the eye.
Another thing that she did mention that does add context to her work is that both of her parents are scientists. She grew up surrounded by scientific text and imagery and so the fact that she was able to take this and create such stunning imagery is quite impressive. Overall I agree with you that it was awesome to have Amanda Knowles exhibit here at Whitworth and it gives yet another diverse perspective on how to take elements of life to create pleasing compositions and beautiful artwork.
I enjoy Amanda's works in general, but I find it difficult to make any connections with the pieces due to my limited scientific knowledge. I also wish that there was a deeper meaning behind the pieces in hopes that I may also make a connection. All things considered, Amanda shows immense talent and creativity in her works. I find it interesting that she takes scientific imagery and puts it into a completely different dimension that brings out another side, the creative side, that is not usually seen in science.
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