MARIA MELCHIORRE
Staff Writer
Fredonia alumna Cecelia Ivy Price will be exhibiting her work at the Sensory Winery & Art Gallery in Ripley, New York, through May 8. Price, who graduated from Fredonia in 2015, creates paintings that address human nature and vulnerabilities.
Price paints sensuous, undulating lines of fleshy human forms, with faces cut off or nondescript. Her rendering of the curves and angles of the human body draw the viewer in. The brushwork is kinetic.
Nudity, a major theme in Price’s works, is included in Fredonia’s art curriculum. The faculty and students do not shy away from the fact that an understanding of the bare lines of the human form is necessary in mastering figure drawing and life drawing.
However, outside Rockefeller Arts Center and Houghton Hall’s studios, in society and the media, nudity has different connotations.
“We should not be living in a society that forces an art teacher to glue pages of art history books together so the students do not see the same naked figures they should have learned about in biology class,” said Price of the taboo placed on nudity in society.
She even went a step further to make the point that an acceptance and understanding of nudity and the human body is lacking in our society, relating it to the fact that we are lacking in sexual health and awareness in our education systems.
“I think the nudity and skulls in my work are reminders that we are all different and all the same at one time. We are all skeletons underneath and we are all naked under our clothes; what is different [are] our personalities,” said Price.
Her work attempts to take the unique difficulties in everyone’s lives and pare them down to something relatable. This is done successfully through the blank canvas, so to speak, of the nude form.
Price is on the board of the North Shore Arts Alliance, a not-for-profit artist-run group that helps Chautauqua County area artists and students get into shows, gain support and participate in workshops. It was through the North Shore Arts Alliance that she was able to set up the exhibit at Sensory gallery.
“Although in the early stages of her career, Cecelia possesses the skill and confidence of a well-seasoned artist. She is insightful and professional, and we enjoy working with her very much,” said Fergie Lutes, gallery director at Sensory.
Sensory Winery & Art Gallery is committed to helping promote and expand the art community in Chautauqua County and beyond. It is an abstract gallery that produces rare, small-lot, highly-blended cult wines. The gallery’s vision is to “meld the perception of our senses into one location.”
It hosts seven to eight art show openings each year for either solo artists or artistic organizations. This includes an open invitational show each fall, where it features the work of both professional and amateur artists, several of whom have never shown their work publicly before. The gallery also offers events such as open mic nights and art classes taught by local instructors.
Sensory is one of the featured locations on the North Shore Arts Alliance’s Art Trail. The Chautauqua-Lake Erie Art Trail, which Price is also a board member of, hosts an open studio tour on Memorial Day weekend, May 28-29 and the third weekend in August 20-21.
The art trail incorporates 24 professional artists whose work represents a variety of media. During the open studio tour participants will be able to see the studio in which Price works.
“My studio is at the Gate House in beautiful Forest Hill Cemetery in one of the upper rooms. I have been creating work in there for a few months now. It’s great to work in a space that does not make me feel constrained,” said Price. “I love the history and nature of the area though, some days I take breaks and go for a walk through the cemetery and frequently see deer and other wildlife.”