"This World of Ours" art by Mark McGinnis

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Dacotah Prairie Museum (1)
Lamont Gallery
21 S Main St, Aberdeen SD

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This World of Ours…Art of Mark McGinnis

Mark McGinnis, the prolific artist whose career spans twenty-five years and whose art interests vary from political to religious to philosophical to literary, is presenting his current exhibition at the Dacotah Prairie Museum in Aberdeen. The show will be open from Wednesday, June 10th through July 31, 2009 regular Museum hours.
McGinnis began his career as an art instructor at Northern State University in
1976 and finished his teaching career in 2006. Through these years, he influenced and guided many now established artists and inspired countless students in a lifetime love of the arts. For the past two decades, he has created numerous projects with a literary base. This World of Ours…is the latest in that series. The sixty paintings in this exhibit are based on haiku poems by Kobayashi Issa (1763-1828), who is considered to be one of the four greatest masters of the Japanese Haiku tradition. Issa’s short poems explored nearly all aspects of human experience with delightful brevity.
“ In my selection of poems for this project,” states McGinnis, “ I favored those that had the qualities I knew I would enjoy translating to visual form. The poems were translated from Japanese by David G. Lanoue of Xavier University of Louisiana and were used by his permission… I invited you to go to Professor Lanoue’s website haikuguy.com where he has over eight thousand of Issa’s poems translated for the public.”
The works of art in this showing are painted with acrylic paint on watercolor paper. The linen scroll presentation alludes to traditional Japanese scrolls and also creates a lightweight method of touring the exhibition.
“A number of the haiku’s I chose might be viewed as being melancholy – dealing with topics such as death and loss. What appeals to me in these poems is the clear sense of acceptance and non-resistance. These are qualities that I find, as I grow older, to be of the utmost importance to live a life of contentment. The paintings were a joy for me to do. My hope is that they will also be a joy for your viewing.”
Mark McGinnis lives with his wife, “Sam”, on the Lady C Ranch near Hot Springs, SD, and is planning in the near future to move to Idaho to be closer to their children and grandchildren. This is his final large touring exhibition to include the Midwest on the touring schedule. The South Dakota tour of this exhibit received partial funding from the South Dakota Arts Council, provided with funds from the State of South Dakota, through the Department of Tourism and State Development, and the National Endowment for the Arts. This World of Ours… is now open and everyone is welcome.-+

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gallery lamont mark mcginnis art free