Artist Rafal Olbinski to discuss current exhibition at JCSM

AUBURN, Ala.- Noted painter, printmaker and illustrator Rafal Olbinski will be discussing his current exhibition at The Jule Collins Smith Museum of Fine Art is Thursday, January 15, 2009 at 5:00 p.m. New Dreams of Old Values, a collection of recent paintings by Olbinski, is on display at JCSM from December 13, 2008 through February 28, 2009. This program is part of the museum’s Third Thursday Free Nights and is open to the public.
New Dreams of Old Values builds upon a series of Olbinski paintings commissioned by the German periodical Der Stern. These images address issues of ethics and morality in the modern world. The JCSM exhibition features the artist’s recent musings on the subject, redeveloped as finished easel paintings. The exhibition is augmented by selected study drawings and a collection of Olbinski’s printed posters.
A native of Poland, Olbinski immigrated to the United States in 1981 and quickly established a successful career for himself as a contemporary surrealist artist. His inventive and highly evocative imagery has appeared in publications such as Atlantic Monthly, New York Times, New Yorker, Newsweek, and Time magazine. Olbinski’s distinctive style of mesmerizing imagery is reminiscent of the ground-breaking work by early 20th-century Surrealists Max Ernst, Man Ray, and especially René Magritte—conveying unusual ideas through extraordinary juxtapositions, visual non sequiturs, the element of surprise and compelling painterly technique.
Today, Olbinski continues to produce numerous fine art paintings and murals and has held more than 30 one-man shows during the last decade in the United States, Belgium, Chile, Germany, Japan and Poland. His paintings can be seen in the collections of the National Arts Club, the Smithsonian Institution, the U.S. Library of Congress and the Suntory museum in Osaka, Japan, as well as in numerous private and corporate collections worldwide. He has garnered more than 150 awards for such work, including Gold and Silver Medals from the Art Directors Club of New York, the Society of Illustrators in both New York and Los Angeles, and similar honors in England, France and Italy.

IMPORTANT DATES

December 13, 2008- New Dreams of Old Values exhibition opens
January 15, 2009- Free Night with artist Rafal Olbinski at JCSM at 5 p.m.
February 28, 2009- New Dreams of Old Values exhibition closes

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