Concept Art Gallery is excited to present an exhibition featuring two  artists with unique approaches to sculpture: sculptor, educator, muralist, Robert Lewis Lepper and glass artist Nancy Callan.

Robert Lewis Lepper (1906-1991) created his sculptures using a variety of found objects and uncommon materials from; aluminum sheet, discarded car parts, Plexiglas, metal gears with moveable parts, to tall standing columns created from aluminum and fragments of machinery.  Robert Lepper was a memorable and beloved professor in the Art Department at Carnegie Tech, now Carnegie- Mellon University. His unique teaching style combined anthropology, industrial design, and sociology with pictorial design.  Robert Lepper established the earliest department of Industrial Design at any university in the United States. He directly inspired Andy Warhol and other artists such as Philip Pearlstein and Mel Bochner.

Robert Lepper’s work can be found in the permanent collections of the Stedelijk Museum, Amsterdam, and the Museum of Modern Art, New York.  Nancy Callan has exhibited internationally and throughout the United States. She won the coveted Creative Glass Center of America Fellowship at Wheaten Village, New Jersey.  Her work is included in various permanent collections, including the Museum of Glass, Tacoma, Washington, and the Shanghai Museum of Glass, Shanghai, China.  She most recently was a visiting artist abroad in Berlin and Helsinki and will serve as honorary chair for the Art on Fire Celebration and Auction and artist-in-residence at the Pittsburgh Glass Center in September 2013.  Concept Art Gallery will host a reception with artist Callan on Thursday, September 26, from 6-8 PM.

Since 1996, Seattle based glass artist Nancy Callan uses traditional Venetian glass technique to make objects inspired by fashion, children’s toys, and her own joy working with glass. These sculptures exude a playful and contemporary feel, all while demonstrating her serious skill and attention to historical glass making methodology.

This exhibition juxtaposes the delicate airiness of Callan’s glass creations with the angular industrial durability of Lepper’s designs, yet they each express a whimsical nature that employs technique and knowledge rooted in Art History.  The resulting exhibition allows viewers to experience diametrically differing modes of expression, yet see how both artists were influenced by the popular culture of their given time.

Exhibition Dates: September 7 — October 8, 2013