211 South art gallery is currently featuring work by Ziba Rajabi and Suzannah Schreckhise. The show runs from Nov. 14, 2020, through Feb. 5, 2021. 211 SOUTH is a contemporary art gallery located within Engel & Völkers NWA at 211 South Main Street in Bentonville, AR.  The gallery, a newly made-over, dedicated gallery space inside Engel & Völkers NWA (formerly Midtown Associates), works to foster connections between the artists and the community.  Midtown Associates partnered with the global real estate company, Engel & Völkers in January 2020.  The Gallery is open Monday thru Friday 9am – 5pm and by appointment. They can be reached at (479) 268-5170).  All work is available for purchase.

Both artists – Rajabi and Schreckhise – highlighted in this new exhibition utilize the language of abstraction and tactility to provoke questions and spaces for reflection about place and our current times.  Materiality, texture, color, and shape all play essential roles.  Symbols and forms within their work evoke specificity in time and place and question historical narratives. Salvaged pieces of wood from a dying tree in Schreckhise’s front yard have been bent by hand into new sculptural forms. Rajabi’s drawings from memories of a now far away home evoke familiar feelings of both reconciliation and longing. Viewer interpretation and participation are encouraged.

Prompted by the show, Schreckhise made a fiber artwork in response to one of Rajabi’s memory drawings, which will be shown for the first time.

The new space was originally scheduled to open in April of this year but choose to delay due to the COVID-19 pandemic and shifted to a virtual exhibition instead.  “We didn’t want to rush and waited until CDC released more guidelines to prevent the spread of the virus. Now we can hold it with more confidence while taking all the precautions seriously.” said Michelle Dearing. No reception is scheduled, and masks are required.  The virtual exhibition is still available for viewing.   

ABOUT THE ARTISTS

Ziba Rajabi received her MFA from the University of Arkansas, Fayetteville, and her BFA from the Sooreh University, Tehran. She is the recipient of the student artist grant for the Artist 360 program sponsored by Mid-America Arts Alliance. Her work has been included in a number of exhibitions, nationally and internationally, such as Masur Museum, LA; CICA Museum, South Korea; Aran Gallery, Iran; Art Fields, SC; Pensacola Museum, Florida; Site:Brooklyn, NY; Amos Eno Gallery, NY; Millersville University’s Skyes Gallery, PA; and Mim Gallery, Los Angeles.

Suzannah Schreckhise earned her BA at the University of the Ozarks in Clarksville and was a 2018 Artist INC Fellow. She has participated in numerous state and national exhibitions, receiving 1st place at the 2019 RAM Invitationals and the NEA Big Read Recycled Art Exhibition at the Windgate Gallery at UA Fort Smith, as well as Best Sculpture Award for her piece “Falling to Pieces” in the 2018 Artists of Northwest Arkansas Exhibition. She has participated in group exhibits, including Our Front Porch, sponsored in part by the Mid-America Arts Alliance, as well as Best Sculpture Award for her piece “Falling to Pieces.”

in the 2018 Artists of Northwest Arkansas Exhibition. Her work also has been featured in the international juried art magazine, Studio Visit, and several other local and national publications. Schreckhise was juried into the Arkansas National Committee for the National Women’s in the Arts Museum Artist registry in 2019 and the ANCNWAM 2021 Arkansas state Woman to Watch exhibition, Paper Routes, curated by Allison Glen.

ABOUT THE CURATOR

Kellie Lehr is the Gallery Director and Curator for 211 South and an artist. Lehr holds a BS in International Economics and spent 2013–2018 studying in the Drawing and Painting program at the University of Arkansas and is currently an MFA candidate at Lesley Art and Design in Boston, MA. In 2019, she was selected for Art File by The Painting Center in New York and the National Museum of Women in the Arts juried registry by its Arkansas committee. Recent exhibitions include 21C Museum Hotel in Bentonville, the 59th Annual Delta Exhibition at the Arkansas Arts Center in Little Rock, Tapped at Manifest Gallery in Cincinnati, and New Optics at The Painting Center in NYC.

 

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