New exhibit at Olin gallery
Doug McGlumphy’s new art installation, “Regular Guy Monuments,” will open at 6 p.m. today with a reception and artist talk in the Olin Fine Art Gallery at Washington & Jefferson College. The show runs through Oct. 23.
The exhibit has been 10 years in the making. McGlumphy, an art instructor at W&J and the director of Olin Fine Art Gallery, found inspiration for the show’s towering monoliths during a family vacation to Washington, D.C., in 2006.
“We were visiting the many monuments, and it occurred to me that all these structures to our famous heroes, presidents and politicians were really created on the backs of hard-working, ordinary citizens,” he said. “The workmanship and the craftsmanship of those laborers and our current workers still are viable and in need of being honored.”
McGlumphy’s work has always been architecturally influenced, and this show is no different. Repurposed and salvaged building material, such as windows, barn siding and stone from McGlumphy’s family farm and the surrounding area make up the pieces in “Regular Guy Monuments.”
The art is a way of preserving architecture; in this case, that of McGlumphy’s rural life. He and his wife purchased the neglected farm in Stone Creek, Ohio, in the 1990s. Then they embarked on a restoration process that included moving a nearly 200-year-old cabin to the property, and opening Hisrich Hills House Bed and Breakfast there.
McGlumphy’s artwork stands as a monument to the current disenfranchised mood of American workers, and highlights their contributions to important, but often overlooked, ways of life.
All Olin Fine Art Gallery events and exhibitions are free. The gallery is open daily from noon to 7 p.m. during exhibitions, and is closed during college breaks. For more information about the exhibit, visit www.washjeff.edu/regular-guy-monuments-pays-tribute-to-the-working-man.