VISION: CHRISTINA TARSELL AND EMILY TARSELL
Rosenberg Gallery
Christina Tarsell Blue Painting, 2008 oil on canvas 36” x 48”
Christina Tarsell Untitled monoprint, 2008 printing ink on paper 22” x 28”
This work explores vision in both a literal and metaphorical sense. The two artists, daughter Christina and mother Emily Tarsell ’86, were inspired by the experience of light, color, and texture of the physical world, while also exploring physical materials to externalize concepts and feelings, the stuff of inner visions. Chris was a young artist with a philosophical bent who deeply related to the aesthetic of modern art, especially those of the expressionists Pollock and Rothko. For her senior thesis at Bard College, she embarked
Emily Tarsell Earth and Beyond, 2014 mixed-media 22” x 22”
on an ambitious project combining painting and sculpture, and she had a notebook of ideas she wanted to explore, but she died suddenly at 21. While we will never witness the realization of her ambitions, we can experience something of her vision through the art she left behind. Her spirit and vibrant work inspired renowned composer Jonathan Leshnoff’s piano quintet Radiance in Memory of Christina Tarsell. After her daughter’s death, Emily felt a pressing need to repeatedly explore images of Chris through creative acts. For her, Dark Days was
Christina Tarsell Red Painting, 2008 oil on canvas 36� x 48�
gut-wrenching, and Sweetheart, You are Always on My Mind provided solace. Emily found herself returning to themes she had not explored since she was a student at Cooper Union and, later, at a MICA graduate program. Degree programs at University of Pennsylvania. and Goucher College, a career as a licensed psychotherapist, and motherhood intervened. She now again explores materials to evoke imaginative energy, color fields, movement, light, and the interpenetration of form and space. Emily feels connected with Chris through all that they deeply loved, including light, color, and texture.
OCTOBER 16 – NOVEMBER 18, 2015 Sunday, October 25, 2015 5:30-7:30 p.m. Artists’ Reception Rosenberg Gallery 7:30-8:30 p.m. A performance of Radiance in Memory of Christina Tarsell, written by renowned composer Jonathan Leshnoff and performed by Yonatan Grinberg (violin), Kevin Smith (violin), Peter Minkler (viola), Kristin Ostling (cello), and Andrea Sokol-Albert (piano) Merrick Lecture Hall
Rosenberg Gallery GALLERY HOURS
DIRECTIONS
9 a.m. to 5 p.m. Monday – Friday 410-337-6477
Baltimore Beltway, I-695, to exit 27A. Make first left onto campus.
COVER (L) Christina Tarsell, Untitled Landscape, 2005, oil on canvas, 12” x 16” (R) Emily Tarsell, Burning Bush, 2015, acrylic and inks on paper, 14” x 20” “Earth is the shore of the cosmic ocean.” – A Serbian proverb
The exhibit is free and open to the public. The Rosenberg Gallery program is funded with the assistance of grants from the Maryland State Arts Council, an agency funded by the state of Maryland and the National Endowment for the Arts, and the Baltimore County Commission on the Arts and Sciences.
16196-4166 10/15