Whitfield Lovell, Visiting Artist Lecture 2005

Artist and Skowhegan alum Whitfield Lovell gives a lecture exploring his interests in object collecting and family stories. Lovell works with found material with a particular emphasis on clothing. For Lovell, clothing works as a way to document the transience of human life. Lovell also talks about his interest in photographs and the important step he took shifting from personal photographs to found photographs. This process allowed for a visual awakening to take place. For Lovell, photographic imagery represents a way of storing information and building a repository of histories. Lovell finds these photographs at a range of places from antique shops to photo markets. Lovell spends time talking about one particular installation Whispers from the Wall, where he worked in site specific locations to understand legacies of slavery and history, particularly Richmond, Virginia, and Denton, Texas. Lovell tells the participants to always be engaged and open, work hard, and always be in a space of growth as an artist. Lovell says that following these steps will always allow artists to create new series of works where the work can get stronger.