CHAMPAIGN, Ill. – Landscapes – with a twist – are the focus of two new, but very different, exhibitions on view March 5 through 27 at I space, the Chicago gallery of the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign.
• “Stone Poems: Architecture and the Land” showcases the photography of James P. Warfield, the ACSA Distinguished Professor in Architecture Emeritus at Illinois. The show explores and celebrates worldwide architectural works, which, according to Warfield, “exemplify the very best in culture/nature, architecture/land relationships.” The photographs are drawn from Warfield’s vast archive of original images that document vernacular and historic architecture. Warfield said the images “illustrate how some cultures around the world have, through time, established principles of design that honor nature.” Further, he said, they demonstrate “how some cultures have found a balance between what they take from the land and what they return to it.”
• “Two Projects: Between Now and Then and As Fast as I Can ” features new video and paintings by Toronto-based artist Marie de Sousa. The paintings are informed by photographic source materials of specific sites, shot at designated intervals over the course of a year. Much of de Sousa’s work explores the nature of time and its passing, as well as themes of aging and loss.
An opening reception is scheduled to take place from 5-7 p.m. March 5 at the gallery, 230 W. Superior St., Chicago.
I space gallery hours are Tuesday through Saturday, 11 a.m. to 5 p.m.