Dale Newkirk

Art imitating life 

If art imitates life, then Dale Newkirk, this year's recipient of the President's Award for Excellence in Artistic Activity, is living a great one.

In addition to being a well-respected artist himself with more than 20 one-person exhibitions, Newkirk, an associate professor of visual arts, serves as director and curator of University Art Galleries, including the Contemporary Art Gallery.

"Dale is a rare individual, combining a keen sense of artistic sophistication and intellect with a formidable eye for curating numerous exhibits in Southeastern's Contemporary Art Gallery, a venue he launched in 2004 and shaped into a center of national import," said Interim Head of the Department of Fine and Performing Arts Ken Boulton. "His tireless efforts have resulted in no fewer than 99 distinct exhibitions featuring the work of regional, national, and international artists. Each exhibit is stunning and thought-provoking. His capacity to seek out subject matter relevant to today's society, combined with a profoundly discerning artistic sense is what has transformed our gallery into a nucleus of consistent scholarship, creativity and beauty."

A member of the faculty since 2003, Newkirk's body of artwork includes sculpture, public art, installations, drawing, and, to a lesser degree, photography. Since receiving his Master of Fine Art in 1984, he has had 22 one-person exhibitions, four two-person exhibitions, and participated in 71 group exhibitions. These include exhibitions in major museums and galleries in the art centers of New Orleans, Los Angeles, San Francisco, Santa Fe, Chicago, Madrid, Mexico City, and New Delhi. He has also completed five public sculpture commissions and three stage designs for theatre.

As a curator, Newkirk has developed a national reputation for exhibitions that push contemporary boundaries and expand ideas of how art functions in society.

"Exhibitions such as the 'National Cell Phone Photography Exhibition' had over 300 entries and influenced other curators who created similar exhibitions in their galleries," Newkirk said.

He added that the "Ink and Needles: Tattoo Art Exhibition" he curated for the Contemporary Art Gallery is one of the few exhibitions on this subject in a fine art context.

"It took over a year to break down barriers and to build the trust needed to get artists to agree to be in the exhibition," he said. "The exhibition led to another exhibition, organized by the LSU Union Art Gallery. The LSU exhibition focused more on photo images from the history of the tattoo, but also used my artist list for the contemporary portion of the show. I contacted and invited the artists to be in their exhibition and organized and moderated a panel discussion."

Newkirk says his artwork has been nonrepresentational, with the exception of photography and some early drawings. He traditionally works in a visual language that comes out of intuitive studio practice. As an artist, he prefers additive processes, constructing forms in space by adding layers of visual information.

Since his appointment at Southeastern, Newkirk's focus in the studio has been on painted, wall-mounted constructions and drawings made for galleries. The wall-mounted constructions are made of common construction lumber, paint and encaustic. The sculptures are constructed, then cut apart and reformed, revealing surprising visual relationships and interior spaces.

"These sculptures are concerned with the problems of nonrepresentational painting, as well as issues inherent in contemporary sculpture," Newkirk said. "The objects have been informed by a tradition of post-minimalist artwork, and are concerned with scale, color, form, surface, texture, and architectural structure."

Since 2007, Cole Pratt Gallery in New Orleans has represented Newkirk's work and by contract controls the rights for the exhibition of his art, with an exception given for faculty exhibitions and those that expose students and the Northshore community to his artwork. His work has also been represented by Brunner Gallery and HH Gallery in Covington.

"Mr. Newkirk's extraordinary productivity provides our students with the very best example of how to succeed in this industry," Boulton said. "His efforts help to ensure that our graduates are among the most equipped either to enter the workforce or continue their studies at the graduate level."