Press release:
“Looking For You” New & old Photography Exhibition by Rimas Zailskas
Opening reception 6pm-9pm
With Songs and Poetry by Shelby Stephenson, NC Poet Laureate
Saturday, May 20th at the Flood Gallery Fine Art CenterHendersonville-based photographer Rimas Zailskas will display over 150 images both old and new, including his most recent series — masked figures cavorting in a forest — in “Looking for You.” The Opening Reception is from 6pm to 9pm at the Flood Gallery Fine Arts Center, 2160 Hwy 70 near Swannanoa, Saturday May 20th. Shelby Stephenson, the North Carolina Poet Laureate, will be on hand singing and reading his poetry at the event.
Rimas and his wife Mary publish Bold Life and Carolina Home + Garden. Previous exhibits include shows at Flood Gallery in Asheville and Upstairs Artspace in Tryon. Rimas’ projects include editorial, portraiture and “strange” images.
Previous exhibits include two solo shows at the Flood Gallery in Asheville. The Living Mask (2012) was comprised of 30 pinhole portraits of people. Asimulacrum (2014) was the flip side of his previous exhibit. The show was comprised of 20 very large (3” x 4”) black and white portraits, providing an intimate and penetrating look at his subjects.
His current exhibit, “Looking for You,” opening at the Flood Gallery May 20th is an exploration of masks showing portraits of people hiding their inter-most personas behind exotic masks from around the world.
Shelby Stephenson, the North Carolina’s Poet Laureate, will read from his forthcoming book of poetry, titled “Country” at the “Looking for You” exhibition at the Flood Gallery, on May 20th.
Shelby Stephenson grew up on a small farm near Benson, in the Coastal Plain of North Carolina. “Most of my poems come out of my background,” he says, “where memory and imagination play on one another.”
The state of North Carolina presented him with the 2001 North Carolina Award in Literature. And he has received the Bellday Poetry Prize, the Oscar Arnold Young Award, the Zoe Kincaid-Brockman Award, the Brockman-Campbell Award, the Bright Hill Press Chapbook Prize, and the Playwright’s Fund of North Carolina Chapbook Prize.
He is the current Poet Laureate for the State of North Carolina.
The “Looking for You” Photo exhibit and readings by Shelby Stephenson are free and open to the public at the non-profit Flood Fine Arts Center, May 20th from 6pm to 9pm The photo exhibit runs through June 30th 2017.
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