Louise Siddons

Co-Author of "Rethinking Regionalism: 20th-century American Art and Visual Culture" and "Geoethics: Works by Ying Kit Chan"

January 10, 2022

Louise Siddons is a Professor of Art History at Oklahoma State University, where she teaches courses in American and Native American visual and material culture, as well as the histories of printmaking and photography. Her research focuses on visual resistance to structures of marginalization in modernity and has covered topics from the eighteenth century to the present. She was the founding curator and co-director of the Oklahoma State University Museum of Art; her first book, "Centering Modernism," was about the Oklahoma printmaker J. Jay McVicker. She is currently completing a book about photographer Laura Gilpin that examines the intersection of lesbian and Navajo sovereignty politics at mid-century. In addition to several recent shorter publications on Gilpin, Siddons published an article on Red Power in the Black Panther newspaper in American Art, the journal of the Smithsonian American Art Museum, in summer 2021.

About "Rethinking Regionalism: 20th-century American Art and Visual Culture"

"Rethinking Regionalism: 20th-century American Art and Visual Culture" is a collection of essays addressing questions such as: What marks the various stages and styles of art in the West? What alternative stories might a renewed look at the artists, teachers and students of the West produce? In what ways would a reexamination of early instructional practices change existing narratives? How does critiquing, revising and updating our understanding of 20th-century Western art help us envision new histories and futures? In that context, Siddons's essay "Whither Art? Laura Gilpin and Photography at the Colorado Springs Fine Arts Center" considers Gilpin's groundbreaking work as a photography instructor and artist at the Fine Arts Center–work that even the Center itself has historically underrecognized. The essay takes a close look at Gilpin's course syllabi, working notes and exhibition history, making a case for the Fine Arts Center as one of the first institutions–and Gilpin as one of the first individuals–to teach photography in an art school in the United States.

About "Geoethics: Works by Ying Kit Chan"

In 1977, Ying Kit Chan’s "The Way Is A Void," a woodcut print, was selected by the Hong Kong Museum of Art for the Urban Council Award at the Hong Kong Contemporary Art Biennial. The title of this work was taken from the Chinese classical text Dao De Jing. The teachings of Dao De Jing influenced Chan’s artistic style and conceptual themes, which reflect the spirit of nature and alert of human destruction to our planet.

Along the path of development, his contemplative work also synthesized Western ideas of Romanticism, American transcendentalism, existentialism and phenomenology. While his broad interests in philosophy range from Aristotle, Spinoza, Schopenhauer, Ursula Le Guin, John Rawls to Alain Badiou, his philosophical investigation often leads him back to his roots to intersect with Daoism and Buddhism. The selected images in this book outline several themes and represent varied mediums in Chan’s artistic expression of the subject. Like the order of the universe, this artistic journey has come full circle.

URL: https://library-dep.okstate.edu/news/celebratingbooks/2022-honorees/louise-siddons

Last Updated: 19 January 2022