RALEIGH, N.C.– From scooters and books to textiles and paintings, Crosscurrents: Art, Craft and Design in North Carolina displays the diverse work of 24 North Carolina artists. The exhibition, presented at the North Carolina Museum of Art in partnership with The Mint Museums in Charlotte, N.C., opens September 25, 2005. Crosscurrents provides artists with a rare opportunity to have their work exhibited at the NCMA.

The 67 works in the exhibition vary in media and size and exemplify the broad range of works currently being created across the state. Many artists use their work for political and social commentary; others critique modern culture.

“The variety and quality of the work make for a fascinating and thought-provoking exhibition,” said co-curator Huston Paschal of the NCMA. “Crosscurrents explores the artistic achievements of artists residing in this state. We enjoyed discovering the work of artists who were new to us and also seeing how the work of more familiar artists was developing.”

The project is an innovative undertaking: It marks the first time the two museums have collaborated to present such an exhibition. In the past both museums hosted exhibitions that featured contemporary works by North Carolina artists. The NCMA’s North Carolina Artists Exhibition began in 1937, and The Mint Museums have presented some version of a statewide show since 1958.

Exhibition co-curators Huston Paschal, curator of modern art at the NCMA; Linda Johnson Dougherty, curator of contemporary art at the NCMA; Carla M. Hanzal, curator of contemporary art at the Mint Museum of Art; and Melissa G. Post, curator of craft and design at the Mint Museum of Craft + Design, evaluated and selected works for the exhibition.

“Working on this exhibition has been a wonderful experience,” said Hanzal. “The process of organizing an exhibition like this—working collegially with the staff of another museum, visiting artists’ studios during the selection process, and finally selecting the works for the show—was enlightening.”

In June 2004, curators from the NCMA and The Mint Museums issued a call for entries from artists working in the state. From the 550 artists who submitted work, 23 individual artists and one collaborative group of five (called EAT) were chosen to participate in Crosscurrents. The selected works include painting, sculpture, installation work, textiles, books, paper, photography and prints.

The exhibition includes three room-size installations, incorporating sophisticated technology and video, as well as humble furniture. Objects that fit in the hand—tea bowls, artist’s books—represent the other extreme of scale.

Crosscurrents presents lavish paintings by Page H. Laughlin and Maja Godlewska; fabric collages by Marguerite J. Gignoux; ink-jet prints by Michael Schultz; and stoneware by Greg Scott. Nylon used by Gwen Bigham, marble carved by David Finn, mirrored paint applied by Jimmy O’Neal, and aluminum hand-wrought by Nikki Blair all suggest the variety of materials employed: traditional, exotic, fragile, lasting.

A monumental photo collage by Anne Kesler Shields tackles the weighty subjects of politics and religion. David B. Brodeur, Marek Ranis, Ron Rozzelle, and elin o’Hara slavick address weapons of war and their impact on society.

Jack Ketner, Jeff Whetstone, and Schultz are attuned to environmental concerns. Whetstone bridges the divide between the natural and the scientific in his black-and-white photographs. Ketner exposes modern society’s deadening effect on the animal world, and Schultz considers the aesthetic and societal implications of a different kind of loss—derelict industrial relics.

Critiques of culture can be found in Lauren F. Adams’s domestic interiors, the paintings of Laughlin, and EAT’s walk-in installation. Culture, examined through personal behavior and personal history, plays a role in the handmade books of Stacey L. Kirby and the sleek scooters of Blair.

Kirby and Blair introduce references to the human body, which are also found in the work of Bigham, Susan Brenner, Julia Elsas and Godlewska. Jennie Bireline shapes her pots to relate to the human body, and she personalizes the content in a profoundly poignant way. The autobiographical element present in Bireline’s earthenware turns up in Rozzelle’s altarpiece and in nonfigurative works such as the fabric “self-portrait” by Gignoux and the face-size abstractions of Hayley Kyle.

The multiple layers of Christopher Curtin’s video installation and the reflective surfaces of O’Neal’s paintings examine how the world and works of art are perceived.