Artist Talk by Leonardo Drew

The Raclin Murphy Museum of Art is delighted to welcome Leonardo Drew, one of the most innovative and acclaimed artists working today. The artist is best known for his bold, yet carefully ordered use of materials—such as wood and metals—that make reference to the cyclical nature of life, the passage of time, and U. S. industrial history. Drew’s work is represented in celebrated private and public collections of contemporary art, including the Metropolitan Museum of Art (New York) ; the Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden (Washington DC) ; the Solomon Guggenheim Museum (New York) ; and the Tate (London) . Leonardo Drew will engage in a public conversation with collector and close friend Fred Giuffrida (ND ’73) . Giuffrida and his wife, Pamela Joyner, are among the most prominent collectors and admired arts patrons in the United States today. Drew’s 2015 installation Number 52S is on long-term loan to the Raclin Murphy Museum of Art from the Joyner/Giuffrida Collection, which focuses on contemporary abstract art by African American artists and artists of the African diaspora. Number 52S is an iconic work within the artist’s repertoire. It unfolds before the viewer with the captivating visual attention for which Drew is so well known. Like many of his monumental abstract works, Number 52S achieves a tense balance between chaos and order, between encountered randomness and structured accumulation. Drew’s numbered rather than descriptive titles invite the viewer’s personal, creative, and intellectual response to the experience of the work. This event is free and open to all. Originally published at raclinmurphymuseum.nd.edu.