Paintings by Liz Rundorff Smith on display in Thompson Gallery

Paintings by Liz Rundorff Smith will be on display in Thompson Gallery, Roe Art Building, Aug. 1-25. Rundorff Smith, who is Art School Director for Greenville Center for Creative Arts (GCCA), will present a talk about her work during a reception Friday, Aug. 25, 6-7:30 p.m. in the gallery. Regular Thompson Gallery hours are Monday-Friday, 9 a.m.-5 p.m.

Her exhibition, Found Paintings, is free and open to the public and is presented by the Furman University Department of Art.

In a statement, Rundorff Smith says,

My work explores the presence of loss and the abandonment of the secure to confront the instability of memory. I am interested in capturing the traces that are left behind when a tangible presence is lost. In the precarious space between representation and abstraction I find a compelling duality between presence and absence. I work from familiar spaces that are stripped of detail so that the resulting imagery is an uncanny reminder of a place but serves as a physical representation of loss. Ultimately, the image left behind in the process, while tied to a tangible experience, serves as a mask of the original moment.

Liz Rundorff Smith presents “Found Paintings.”

Rundorff Smith received a bachelor’s in Studio Art from the College of Wooster (Wooster, Ohio) in 2000. She studied abroad at The Marchutz School of Painting in Aix en Provence, France in 1998 and The British Institute of Florence in Florence, Italy in 2004. From 2000 to 2003 she served as Program Director of the Hoyt Institute of Fine Arts in New Castle, Penn. where she developed and organized exhibitions and educational programming. In 2005, she received an MFA in Painting from Edinboro University of Pennsylvania.

Rundorff Smith moved to Greenville in 2006 to serve as Program Director for the Artisphere arts festival until July of 2016. During her tenure with Artisphere, the festival gained national recognition and top industry rankings.

As Art School Director, Rundorff Smith upholds GCCA’s mission is to enrich the cultural fabric of the community through visual arts promotion, education and inspiration.

Rundorff Smith lives in Travelers Rest with her husband and two daughters, and continues to exhibit her work in solo and group exhibitions.

For more information about the exhibition, contact the Furman University Department of Art, 864-294-2995. Or visit the artist’s website at www.lizrundorffsmith.com.