Charles McGill Featured in Westchester Biennial

Charles McGill is featured in The Castle Gallery’s Westchester Biennial, a juried show featuring twenty artists exclusively from Westchester County, New York. The show opens on Tuesday, March 27. An opening reception will be held April 15, from 2:00-4:00 pm. The exhibition closes June 17, 2012.

The juried art exhibition began in 1998, its goal as stated by Katrina Rhein, Director of the Castle Gallery, is to “showcase recent work by both emerging and established artists throughout Westchester County.” Selections of paintings, installation, photography, sculpture, mixed media, and works on paper created in the last two years were selected from approximately 100 artists by a panel of jurors which include Chana Benjamin, visual artist and founder, president/director of New Century Artists, Inc., New York, NY; Mary Birmingham, curator at the Visual Arts Center of New Jersey, Summit, NJ; and Ruth Hardinger, visual artist and environmental activist, New York, NY.

Susan Hodara, of The New York Times, in her May 18, 2012 review of the Westchester Biennial stated:

The selections were installed by Katrina Rhein, Castle Gallery’s director, and Michelle Jammes, its manager. “I like to hang something provocative facing the front door,” Ms. Rhein said.

Charles McGill, RAMWAR This year, that piece is Charles McGill’s “RAMWAR.” This 4-by-4-foot sculptural assemblage of fragments of golf bags greets visitors head on: assorted straps, buckles, zippers and tan, brown and red leather are reconstructed to suggest a (somewhat menacing) hooded torso. Mr. McGill, whose alter ego is Art Negro, the fictitious founder of the Former Black Militant Golf and Country Club, took up golfing in the 1990s and began making related artwork soon after. “RAMWAR” and a second piece in the biennial, “The Scream,” are from his latest series, “Skinned.”

“Golf bags are not meant to come apart,” said Mr. McGill, whose work has been exhibited nationally and appeared in the 2008 “Westchester Biennial,” “so there’s no way to make these pieces without getting really frustrated. I get so angry, and some of that emotion ends up in the work.”

“RAMWAR,” he said, embodies aggressiveness. “When I put the zipper on the hood where the mouth might be, the aggression is heightened,” he said. “It’s like gnashing teeth.”

The entire May 18, 2012 review, Diverse, Innovative, and Now Outdoors by Susan Hodara, can be found on nytimes.com.

Charles McGill, an adjunct professor of painting and drawing, is a working artist who has spent the last 20 plus years making and exhibiting his work professionally. His art work has been reviewed in The New York Times and Art in America and appears in several private and public collections. Charles is also a published illustrator. As an eclectic and versatile artist, his work runs the gamut from painting and drawing to performance-based media and sculpture. McGill holds a B.F.A., from the School of Visual Arts, an M.F.A., from Maryland Institute College of Art, and a residency at Skowhegan School of Painting and Sculpture.

The Castle Gallery at the College of New Rochelle is located at 29 Castle Place, New Rochelle, New York. The gallery hours are Tuesday-Friday 10:00 am to 5:00 pm, Wednesday 10:00 am to 8:00 pm, Saturday and Sunday, 12:00–4:00 pm, closed on Monday. For more information, visit cnr.edu/Arts/AbouttheCastleGallery or call 914.654.5248.

Charles McGill Featured in Westchester Biennial

News Archives