Rozsa Art Gallery to host reception for Chandra Dieppa Ortiz exhibit Feb. 20

HOUGHTON -- The Rozsa Center is hosting an opening reception for artist Chandra Dieppa Ortiz's solo exhibit, "The Record Player Project: Fragment/Appropriate/Remix," at 6 p.m., Saturday, Feb. 20, in the Rozsa Art Gallery.

Dieppa's work is powerful and colorful -- contemporary in subject matter, but timeless in its honest and unflinching observation of the human condition.

Curator Michael G. Bennett of Vassar College writes this of Dieppa's work: "The works of the artist known as Dieppa reveal and render problematic any number of societal issues, but always through a visual vernacular that stresses the beauty intrinsic to even the most inhumane conditions. Like the works of the great appropriationists/collagists of the 20th century, bracketed by Braque, Picasso and other cubists at its opening, and near its close by Romare Bearden, Dieppa's art visualizes fragmented spaces, multi-dimensional collapses and detonated yet immediately almost-recognizable figures, all reconstituted by her polarizing thought and deft technique into a coherent form, like iron filings in a strong magnetic field."

Dieppa works in paintings, mixed media collage and assemblage -- and explores the historical and contemporary use of storytelling. Dieppa uses musical forms such as jazz, blues and hip-hop to create complex rhythmic compositions that create emotional environments where fragments, symbols and images play against textured surfaces.

Her work explores issues of race, class, gender and culture in the hopes of creating a dialogue between communities and generations by visualizing cultural armor. Dieppa believes that "cultural armor" protects by using love, humor, faith, music, stories and the telling of truths to empower and inspire each generation. Currently, Dieppa is interpreting the works of the late playwright August Wilson through collages that juxtapose the rhythm, dialect and "beautiful struggle" of the black experience in the 20th century.

Dieppa currently works as an adjunct professor at Massachusetts College of Art and with Boston Public Schools as a violence prevention specialist and teacher trainer. She was recently nominated for the prestigious Foster Prize from the Institute of Contemporary Art, Boston.

The exhibit is free and open to the public during Rozsa Box Office hours -- 11:30 a.m. to 5 p.m., Monday through Friday. For more information, contact the Rozsa at 487-3200 or www.rozsa.mtu.edu. For more information on Chandra Dieppa Ortiz, visit www.dieppastudio.com.