North Charleston Arts Festival reveals 2015 design competition winner
North Charleston, S.C. artist Karole Turner Campbell has been named the winner of the 2015 North Charleston Arts Festival Design Competition. Campbell’s mixed media piece, “Jubilee,” (pictured above), will be used to promote the 2015 North Charleston Arts Festival, taking place May 1-9. The artist received a $500 purchase award, and the piece will become part of the city of North Charleston’s Public Art Collection.
Campbell’s design was selected from 47 entries by artists from across the state. The review panel judged entries based on quality, originality, appeal to festival patrons from a broad range of backgrounds, and ability to convey the spirit of the festival as a public celebration of arts and culture.
According to Campbell, “Jubilee” is a visual pun that explores a different approach to traditional color theory. Created with a variety of media including acrylic, oil, reclaimed Styrofoam, and paper, the abstract piece depicts an island of blue “floating and dancing” amidst a yellow sea. “The materials I use are diverse and go beyond just making marks, combining colors, or incorporating objects onto a surface,” she explains. “I am fascinated with layering and creating real or implied texture and this fascination leads me to consistently uncover new, distinct modes of expression.”
Campbell earned a Master of Fine Arts degree in drawing and painting from the City University of New York, a Bachelor of Science degree in art education from North Carolina A&T State University, and an art major diploma from the prestigious High School of Music & Art in New York City. A retired New York City principal, she now works as a full-time visual artist. Her body of work is quite eclectic, ranging from representational to abstract, and two dimensional to three dimensional. Recently she has been creating conceptual, mixed media pieces that juxtapose antithetical ideas and materials to engage viewers in an open-ended conversation that can be ethereal and visceral, sublime and earthly, universal and specific, and spiritual and profane.
Since moving to the Lowcountry in 2006, Campbell has immersed herself in the local arts community by exhibiting her works in solo shows, group shows, and galleries. She has curated two invitational group shows for the MOJA Arts Festival and served as a juror for the Avery Research Center’s national juried exhibition in 2011. In 2012, she was a featured artist at Penn Center’s Centennial Celebration Exhibition and exhibited her work in a solo show, Eternal Vigilantes, at the Avery Research Center in Charleston, S.C., the following year. In addition, her work has been displayed in a number of venues and events throughout the state, including the City Gallery at Waterfront Park in downtown Charleston, ArtFields in Lake City, the Charleston County Library, the Charleston Artist Guild Gallery, the North Charleston City Gallery, the North Charleston Arts Festival, and the S.C. Palmetto Hands Juried Fine Craft Exhibition.
Campbell’s work, including the winning piece, will be on display at the North Charleston City Gallery throughout the month of May 2015. The public is invited to meet the artist at the gallery on May 2 and 3 during the Main Event of the North Charleston Arts Festival. T-shirts and posters featuring the winning design will be available for sale.
For more information about the North Charleston Arts Festival, contact the City of North Charleston Cultural Arts Department at (843) 740-5854, email culturalarts@northcharleston.org, or visit NorthCharlestonArtsFest.com. Additional information about the artist can be found at www.ktcsart.com.