Beverly Fishman, "Untitled (Pain)," 2015, 60 inches x 60 inches x 2.25 inches. Urethane paint on wood. Courtesy of the artist.Selected works from artist Beverly Fishman that explore the pharmaceutical industry’s role in modern health care will be on exhibition Jan. 20-March 18 at the University of Alabama at Birmingham.
“Beverly Fishman: Another Day in Paradise” is presented by the College of Arts and Sciences’ Abroms-Engel Institute for the Visual Arts. AEIVA will present a free screening of the film "Side Effects" alongside a tour of the exhibition "Beverly Fishman: Another Day in Paradise," at 6:45 p.m. March 2. The film and exhibition are free and open to the public.
Pulling aesthetically from the minimalists and pop artists of the 1960s and 1970s, Fishman’s recent work blurs the line between painting and sculpture while also investigating the way the pharmaceutical industry markets and brands its products to consumers.
“By taking two-dimensional, geometric compositions and having them fabricated as three-dimensional painting/sculpture hybrids, Fishman is subtly and perhaps playfully subverting traditional ideas about the physical attributes of a painting,” said AEIVA Curator John Fields. “However, when you realize that these abstract paintings are each modeled after a specific brand of ‘real world’ medication, you see the layers of social commentary present in the work.”
A free and public panel discussion with the artist, Fields and Richard E. Powers, M.D., professor of neuropathology in the UAB School of Medicine will take place in the AEIVA Lecture Hall at 5 p.m. prior to the reception. The three will discuss the social issues surrounding Fishman’s exhibition as well as the broader intersection of visual arts, pharmaceuticals and health care.
Fishman is artist-in-residence and head of the painting department at Cranbrook Academy of Art. Fishman received a BFA degree from Philadelphia College of Art and an MFA from Yale University. She has exhibited nationally and internationally, with solo exhibitions in New York, London, Paris, Berlin, Chicago, Los Angeles, St. Louis and Thessaloniki, Greece. Her work has been written about in publications including Artforum, Huffington Post, Modern Painters, Wall Street Journal and Art in America. Fishman has received many awards and grants, including a Guggenheim Fellowship Award, a Louis Comfort Tiffany Foundation Award and a National Endowment for the Arts Fellowship Grant.
AEIVA is open to the public 10 a.m.-6 p.m. Monday-Friday and 12-6 p.m. Saturday. It is closed Sundays and holidays.