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Julie Puma
October 5-27
First Friday Reception October 5, 7-9pm
Sponsored by Chuck & Robbie Breaux

The Art Center is pleased to present Urgent Importance, an exhibition of paintings by Julie Puma. Puma received a Master’s in Art Therapy from the Art Institute of Chicago and a Master’s of Visual Art at the Vermont College of Fine Art. She is currently a full-time professor at the Rocky Mountain College of Art and Design in Denver, Colorado.

Puma’s work can be defined as contemporary expressionism with a focus on the figure. The dynamic use of color in her work skews reality and contains an emotional quality illustrating the disconnection from traditional human relationships that youth are currently facing due to social media platforms. Puma states, “My current work explores themes of technology and communication in an attempt to examine the possibilities and limitations of communication in the 21st century. The rise of the use of technological devices, immediacy of communications, and options of how to communicate pose many questions.”

The fish bowl effect is apparent in these paintings as they force the viewer to look through the lens of a handheld device. Contemporary typography and graffiti are used to communicate the voice of today’s youth. This body of work effectively illustrates real questions and concerns about the potential consequences that may arise from the rapidly changing and growing technological world.