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Although Yinka Shonibare deals with pressing global issues, his work is not dry. He wants viewers to engage on whatever level they choose, whether taking simple delight in his use of brilliantly patterned textiles or responding to the concerns he addresses. Shonibare’s room-size installation “The American Library” is on view at the Davidson College Art Galleries through Dec. 14. The project includes 6,000 books covered in vivid Dutch wax textiles; on the spines of 3,200 of these books are the names of first- and second-generation Americans — some famous, some not — who have benefited from immigration. Most have made...

Written by Lisa Rab, arts correspondent for the Charlotte Observer. In his quest to capture the shape of wind, Yinka Shonibare started with a hair dryer and a piece of fabric. The British-Nigerian artist sees movement as a metaphor for the migration of people – immigrants, slaves, refugees. He wanted his fiberglass sculpture to convey that movement while appearing weightless, as if it were defying gravity. So he photographed the fabric billowing in the dryer’s artificial breeze. That photo became a mold, which he converted into a 3D image, and then a 3D print. That grew into a larger mold, stretching...

Written by Elizabeth Young '20 and Isabelle Sakelaris '19 Passing through the atrium of the E. Craig Wall Jr. Academic Center, visitors can’t help but notice the giant video wall often used for presentations and lectures. When the wall is not being used for presentations, you can see a number of digital artworks, initially selected by members of the Art Collection Advisory Committee, as well as by a few Davidson College Faculty and Staff. This year, the Van Every & Smith Galleries hosted a contest to decide which of thirty new works by contemporary digital artists to acquire for the...

Angy Rivera is a Colombian-American immigrant who fled to the U.S. with her mother due to violence in Colombia when she was just a child. Now in her 20s, she is one of the most vocal undocumented youth activists. Rivera has two siblings who are American-born, and is experiencing the unique struggles of being in a mixed-status family. Although an undocumented immigrant Rivera doesn’t let documentation define her. However, starting at a young age, barriers resulting from her immigration status stood in her way; even scholarship applications are a different reality for undocumented youth. While her teachers encouraged her to...

Yinka Shonibare’s Wind Sculpture (SG) I (2018) made its debut in New York City this past March with much media attention. Resembling a large scrap of fabric or a sail waving in the wind, the sculpture features Shonibare’s signature use of Dutch wax print and remarkably was the artists’ first public work in New York. Thanks to the Public Art Fund, the 3-ton solid fiberglass sculpture remained on view in the Doris C. Freedman Plaza of Central Park through October 14. In advance of Wind Sculpture (SG) I’s permanent installation on the Davidson campus, we collected some of the exciting...