UIS Visual Arts Gallery presents “Avez Vous un Crayon?” by St. Louis artist Lyndon Barrois Jr.

The University of Illinois Springfield Visual Arts Gallery is pleased to present “Avez Vous un Crayon?” by St. Louis-based artist Lyndon Barrois Jr. The exhibit will open on Thursday, August 25, 2016, and run through Thursday, September 15. A reception for the exhibit will take place on Thursday, September 1 from 5:30 to 8 p.m. All events are free and open to the public.

The passing of Prince prompted a personal and critical observation of his life and work. “Avez Vous un Crayon?” borrows a line of dialogue from the 1986 film “Under the Cherry Moon” for its title, and will explore the surreal and metaphoric gestures of Prince to produce an installation of drawing, painting, and sculpture. Prince stands as a radically progressive figure, blurring the distinctions between race, sexuality, genre expression and the spiritual and secular. The title translates to “Do you have a pencil?”, reflecting what Prince has written into history: he constructed his existence on his own terms, with a kind of liberated nature that we all can draw from.

Lyndon Barrois Jr. lives and works in St. Louis. Recent solo exhibitions include “Of Color”, Contemporary Art Museum St. Louis, “For the Benefit of Man”, Garwood Gallery, Western Illinois University, Macomb (2015), and “Float”, Fort Gondo Compound for the Arts, St. Louis (2014). Group exhibitions include “You Are Looking Good, A Real Good Looker”, Chicago Artist Coalition, Chicago (2016), “A Donkey is a Lion, and Insecticide, A Message from God”, Blackburn 20/20 Gallery, New York (2015).

Barrois Jr. has also been the recipient of numerous grants and fellowships, from the Desert Space Foundation, the Gateway Foundation, Regional Arts Commission and the Kittredge Fund. He received his MFA from the Sam Fox School of Design & Visual Art at Washington University in St. Louis. He has been a teaching artist at Stony Island Arts Bank in Chicago, and has served as adjunct faculty member in drawing and design at Washington University in St. Louis, and Webster University, respectively. He is currently the Museum Educator at Contemporary Art Museum St. Louis.

The Visual Arts Gallery is centrally located on the UIS campus in the Health and Science Building, Room 201. Gallery hours are Monday through Thursday 11 a.m. to 6 p.m. For more information, visit the UIS Visual Arts Gallery website at www.uis.edu/visualarts/gallery or contact the gallery at 217/206-6506 or alach@uis.edu.