On Tuesday, September 22nd the Customs House Museum will host a Autumn Equinox Writers Hour. The event will feature local published and amateur authors reading to the group from their works. There is no theme or style required from the writers. Previous writer’s hours have involved poetry, short stories, and blogs. The museum event, which begins at 7 pm is open to the public with no admission fees. There is still room on the agenda for people interested in reading.
The Fall Equinox Writers Hour is in conjunction with artist Alan LeQuire’s installation Dream Forest. LeQuire is an international artist whose work is highly sought after. LeQuire is best known for creating Athena, one of the largest indoor sculptures in the western world, located in Nashville’s Parthenon. Alan’s work includes Tennessee’s Vietnam Veterans’ Memorial and a large bronze relief for the Tennessee State Capitol. Included in his many awards and commendations are a Tennessee Governor’s Citation in 1987 and the American Institute of Architects Design Award for Athena Parthenos.
With this exhibit, Alan LeQuire has merged environmental beauty with the human form, something he believes all viewers respond to as far as subject matter in art. The large textured forms of “Dream Forest” morph gracefully into classical Italian torsos reminiscent of the works LeQuire apprenticed under in his early years. The sculptures flow into the forest floor with poetic narration. The vision completes with eight-foot woodcut prints and a suspended forest ceiling.
“Dream Forest” has made its debut in the transformed Crouch Gallery of the museum.
LeQuire has designed his newest works specific to this space. He says of the show “My goal is to take my usual concrete concerns such as form, texture and spatial relationships, and to place them in a setting that conveys a dreamlike state of consciousness, where ideas are born and all is in a state of flux. I want to explore how this environment changes and affects solid form. I want the viewer to experience something more than sculpture as object. These sculptures will convey a living presence within a space that is deeply significant.”
The exhibit will run through September 27, 2009. The Customs House Museum is the second largest general museum in the state of Tennessee, located at the corner of Second and Commerce Streets. For more information on above event, or if you are interested in reading your works, contact Terri Jordan, Community Relations Director, at 931-648-5780 or terri@customshousemuseum.org.
