Friday, October 11, 2024, through Saturday, February 22, 2025
Artist Talk & Reception: Wednesday, October 23 at  6 PM

Debra March Center of Excellence Art Gallery

The College of Southern Nevada, School of Arts & Letters, and Department of Fine Arts in collaboration with the City of Henderson will host an exhibition of paintings that pull inspiration from Taoist symbolism and American Abstract Expressionist art by CSN Adjunct Professor of Art & Art History, Gwaylon Leaf. Gwaylon Leaf: DisOriented will open on Friday, October 23, 2024, and run through Saturday, February 22, 2025, in the Art Gallery at the City of Henderson’s Debra March Center of Excellence. A special Artist Talk and Reception will take place on Wednesday, October 23, 2024, starting at 6 p.m.

Gwaylon Leaf has been making art across Nevada since graduating with his MFA Degree from the University of Nevada, Reno in 2020. Leaf has received recognition from the First Lady of Nevada for his artwork and his work has been exhibited in both Northern and Southern Nevada as well as Indiana and New York. In his artwork, Leaf navigates the ambiguity of his multicultural identity within a Western environment. As a non-Chinese speaking individual growing up in an environment of Chinese calligraphy, scroll painting, and poetry, Leaf adapts the visual forms and philosophies of traditional Chinese art and reinterprets it through Western influences to create a visual language that speaks to the liminal spaces between cultural boundaries. Leaf is currently investigating the role of the written form within visual arts.

Discussing his work, Leaf says, “My paintings are made as a response to the cultural ambiguity of being an outsider of both Asian-American and White-American culture as a Hapa individual. They are built in layers, representing daily thoughts and meditations on emotional states, natural phenomena, and cosmic movements. In this way, each work becomes a confluence of colors, shapes, and asemic language. These paintings exist as visual poems that defy semantic translation, reading as a language that is more felt and seen rather than being read or spoken. I want my work to be seen as a point of defiance against fitting within set cultural mores. In the words of Bruce Nauman ‘The way artists make the world a better place is by revealing mystic truths.’ As an artist, the goal is to use my art to reveal the ‘mystic truths’ I see in the world.”

The Center of Excellence is a partnership between the City of Henderson and the College of Southern Nevada. Located in West Henderson, this facility is a critical feature for diversifying our industry by fulfilling a need for high-skilled, advanced manufacturing training. This specialized training facility is a valuable resource for both businesses who want to relocate to the area as well as existing locally based companies looking to expand. The Center of Excellence is located in the burgeoning West Henderson area which boasts the popular Henderson Executive Airport and is home to a wide range of distribution centers, corporate headquarters, and industrial parks.

The CSN Arts Galleries are free, family-friendly, and open to the public. Gallery hours of the Debra March Center of Excellence Art Gallery are from 8 a.m. to 5 p.m. Monday through Friday. The Debra March Center of Excellence Art Gallery is closed on Saturday and Sunday, Nevada State Holidays, and between CSN Academic Terms. The Debra March Center of Excellence is located at 2200 Via Inspirada, Henderson, Nevada 89044.

For more information, please call (702) 651-4146
http://www.csn.edu/artgallery
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