Utah Arts Alliance Announces an Exhibit of Fine Art:
EARTH PEOPLE
By Derek Dyer
January 6 – January 31, 2009.
Opening Reception: Friday January 9th, 6 – 10 p.m.
Location: 127 South Main Street, Salt Lake City, Utah
Gallery Hours: Tuesday through Friday, 4 – 8 p.m., Saturday 1 – 5 p.m.
The Utah Arts Alliance will present an exhibit of original fine art photographs created by Salt Lake City artist Derek Dyer, January 6, through January 31st, 2009. The opening reception for the artist will be held Friday January 9th from 6 – 10 p.m., at the Utah Arts Alliance Gallery, 127 S. Main St., Salt Lake City, Utah.
The exhibit’s opening reception will be held in conjunction with the Utah Arts Alliance Recording Arts Program’s Midnight Records recording studio One Year Anniversary Celebration, featuring live music by the local band, Oh! Wild Birds.
The Earth People series is a continuation in the evolution of Derek Dyers popular photographic series’ that spans over a decade. In this newest work ideas of the connectedness between humans and our environment is explored. The subject is covered in the earthy elements that surround them. Through this process the people become earth people. “Although humans are children of the earth we view ourselves separate from the earth and other living things; we think of animals, plants and our environment as something outside of the human experience when really it is all one, interconnected and symbiotic experience,” Dyer says of the concept behind earth people. Elements explored in this series include: salt, sand, soil, leaves, flowers, fire, water and other elements.
My art is about making an emotional connection with people, creating beautiful images or objects and inspiring creativity in others.
I always love to experiment with new mediums and try to create something new and fresh that is beautiful and meaningful. I have worked in photography, painting, sculpture, projection art, multi-media and mixed media as well as fusing these mediums together for different works. My motivation for using different mediums depends mostly on what is my current inspiration and what is the subject matter.
Recently my work has focused on photography. Recent photographic series include: glitter people, glow people, projection people and laser people, and my current series, EARTH PEOPLE. Much of my photography is figurative work in which the subject is covered with some sort of color or material. My current series involves the subject in natural settings covered in earthy materials. Through this series I hope to convey the connectedness humans have to the earth.
Dyer’s work has been featured in numerous art exhibits and has received much local, national and international exposure. I have been published in numerous publications including in the Guinness Book of World Records for building The Diversity Ball the world largest disco ball in 2005, as well as USA Today, CNN, Maxim Magazine Superlatives USA, SL Tribune, Deseret News, City Weekly, Catalyst and SLUG Mag.
Derek E Dyer
Derek Dyer is the Executive Director of the Utah Arts Alliance, a 501c3 non-profit arts organization.
Our mission is to foster the arts in its many forms, to provide venues to facilitate the arts, to provide programming and support for arts and education, to provide a central organization committed to networking and support of Utah’s non-profit arts and educational groups and to provide support and services to Utah’s artists and students.
www.utaharts.org