EXHIBITION OF PAINTINGS BY WILL HARRIS AT ANDERSON GALLERY MAY 14 TO
AUG. 7
A 30-year UB faculty member, Harris' work celebrates the Western New
York landscape

Multimedia is available with this article online at
http://www.buffalo.edu/news/12504

Release date: Tuesday, April 26, 2011
Contact: Patricia Donovan, pdonovan@buffalo.edu
Phone: 716-645-4602
Fax: 716-645-3765

BUFFALO, N.Y. -- The University at Buffalo will present an exhibition
of paintings by Willard "Will" Russell Harris (1933-2008), a 30-year
faculty member of the UB Department of Art, May 14 to Aug. 7 in the
Anderson Gallery, One Martha Jackson Place, Buffalo.

"Will Harris: From Java to Buffalo" will open with a public reception
on May 14 from 7-9 p.m.  Gallery hours are Wednesdays through
Saturdays, 11 a.m. to 5 p.m., and Sundays from 1-5 p.m.

The exhibition will include early conceptual, non-objective paintings
by Harris -- paintings infused with cubist compositional elements -- as
well as later work.

In sum, it will feature acrylics, watercolors and oils painted over the
course of almost three decades, which express the Western New York
landscape around Java Lake south of East Aurora, aspects of the
region's rolling farmland and Buffalo's waterfront.

Harris's cubistic work was influenced by his experiences as a glider
pilot.	It led him to fracture the picture plane to produce a
kaleidoscopic image, which he simultaneously presented with straight-on
views of his subject.

Curator Sandra Firman says his realistic mode, which he turned to after
a brief foray into Abstract Expressionism in the late 1950s, included
such motifs as round-shaped canvases that accommodated and enhanced his
depictions of coins and subway tokens.

She says, "The Java paintings (those whose subject matter is taken from
the area around his home in rural Java, N.Y.) often confuse domestic
interiors with the landscape by representing both through a series of
refracting window-like panes, producing a cubist sensation of a
fluctuating foreground and background where interior and exterior
spaces combine.

"When painting on location," Firmin says, "Harris was a keen observer
of natural light and the changing seasons, particularly fall with its
panoply of emerald greens, rust tones and flaming reds, which saturate
his works on paper with exuberant color."

Harris was born in Bloomington, Ind., and received his BFA from the
John Heron Art School in Indianapolis and his MFA from the Newcomb Art
School, Tulane University.  He began teaching at UB in 1965, chaired
the Department of Art during part of his tenure, and retired from the
university in 1998.

During his lifetime, Harris's work was exhibited at major local venues
and in museums and galleries throughout the country and is included in
many private and corporate collections.

The University at Buffalo is a premier research-intensive public
university, a flagship institution in the State University of New York
system and its largest and most comprehensive campus. UB's more than
28,000 students pursue their academic interests through more than 300
undergraduate, graduate and professional degree programs. Founded in
1846, the University at Buffalo is a member of the Association of
American Universities.

See this article online at: http://www.buffalo.edu/news/12504

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