Selena Nawrocki Wins Month-Long New York Gallery Exhibition

Dr. Selena Nawrocki was one of 23 artists featured at Paperworks 2017 at the B.J. Spoke Gallery in Huntington, New York, in August. She was the only Georgia artist selected for the annual competition and exhibition.  Dark Passage Square, Dr. Selena Nawrocki

VALDOSTA — Dr. Selena Nawrocki was one of 23 artists featured at Paperworks 2017 at the B.J. Spoke Gallery in Huntington, New York, in August. She was the only Georgia artist selected for the annual competition and exhibition.

“It is a great honor to have my work selected for this exhibition and to represent Valdosta State University in a national competition,” said the professor of art and interior design in VSU’s Department of Art and Design.

Nawrocki responded to a Call For Artists posted in March by the B.J. Spoke Gallery. The nonprofit member-owned and member-run cooperative art gallery was looking for United States-based artists with works made of, on, or about paper, including cut paper, folded paper, woven paper, glued paper, drawings, paintings, pastels, prints, photography, paper sculpture, three-dimensional works, bound books, collage, mixed media, video, and installations.

Akili Tommasino, curatorial assistant in the Department of Painting and Sculpture at The Museum of Modern Art in New York City, served as juror for Paperworks 2017. He selected three of Nawrocki’s works — “Style Moderne,” “Dark Passage Square,” and “Coruscation Square” — for the exhibition, which ran Aug. 2-27.

With a strong studio art background working in all fine art media — in addition to interior design — Nawrocki said her work bridges the gap between fine arts and interior design.

“My works of mixed media images represent compositions utilizing the common thread of interior design,” according to her artist statement. “Traditional boundaries of applied arts have been shattered, with my axonometric drawings and renderings yielding a bas-relief sculptural quality associated with the fine arts media. An abstract room interior, rendered in informal balance, is created with line, plane, plus tints and shades of color.

“The effect I am seeking is a mechanized, industrial structure designed to simulate architectural construction elements. Every composition reveals, by its unique strength, how it would resolve itself as it follows the tendencies of its internal forces. I am interpreting nature in its purest, abstract state, constructing a rhythm of pictorial lyricism using reflective objects and staircases. Objects never end; forms intersect with infinite combinations of sympathetic attunements and clashing aversions.

“The honesty of materials is my principle focus in developing a machine-age quality enhanced with shadows and light. Even with the constant threat of chaos with the extensive use of diagonals, sharp angles, informal balance and bold color, I have sought an intuitive sense of ideal order.”

Since arriving at VSU in Fall 2001, Nawrocki’s mixed media art compositions have been accepted to more than 125 international, national, and regional art competitions throughout the United States, winning 34 awards, including the Board of Directors Award at the San Diego Art Institute’s 51^st International Award Exhibition in San Diego, California, in 2011 and the Best In Show Award at the Arts and Design Society’s 19^th Southeast Regional Juried Fine Arts Exhibition at Northwest Florida State College in Niceville, Florida, also in 2011.

Since the beginning of 2017, Nawrocki’s work has been featured in exhibits in Harrisonburg, Virginia; Granbury, Texas; West Palm Beach, Florida; Columbia, Missouri; and Huntington, New York.

Contact Dr. Selena Nawrocki at (229) 333-5835 or snawrock@valdosta.edu to learn more.