South African mark-making artist 
in residence at Faulconer Gallery

GRINNELL — South African artist Diane Victor will make her mark in “Of Fables and Folly,” a Grinnell College exhibition opening Friday.

Victor’s craft, mark-making, will be demonstrated during her residency at Grinnell through mid-February. Her works, which range from traditional etchings to images made with candle smoke, ashes, charcoal and dust, draw heavily on the strife and atrocities in her home country where she teaches drawing and printmaking at the University of Pretoria and Rhodes University.

Exhibition curator Kay Wilson calls Victor “one of the most important South African artists since William Kentridge,” who exhibited at Grinnell in 2004.

“Some of Victor’s works in the exhibition are from the Grinnell College permanent art collection,” Wilson said. “The college’s collection is distinguished by artists’ social commentary against oppression, exploitation and human folly. Grinnell has long been committed to positive social change, and Victor, as one of South Africa’s foremost social realists, brings her political statements to our campus through our collection, her exhibition and with her presence as an artist in residence.”

Victor will demonstrate her unusual smoke drawing technique as part of gallery events related to “Of Fables and Folly:”

• 4:15 to 6 p.m. Friday: Opening reception with artist present.

• 3 to 5 p.m. Feb. 3: Victor will demonstrate mark-making.

• 4:15 p.m. Feb. 8: Gallery talk with the artist.

• 7:30 p.m. March 2: Open mic night co-sponsored by Grinnell College Libraries.

• 8 p.m. March 3: Writers@Grinnell with South African writer Zakes Mda, who will read from his work about the conflict between tradition and consumerism in post-Apartheid South Africa.

• 7:30 p.m. April 14: Fresh Flutes concert, directed by Claudia Anderson, applied music associate.

• 12:15 to 12:50 p.m. Thursdays, beginning Feb. 3: Yoga in the gallery with Monica St. Angelo.

“Of Fables and Folly,” open through April 17, will run concurrently with “Kind Favor, Kind Letter,” through mid-March. “Kind Favor” is a collaboration of three papermakers, including Grinnell faculty artist Lee Emma Running.

Faulconer Gallery hours are noon to 5 p.m. Tuesday, Wednesday, Saturday and Sunday; noon to 8 p.m. Thursday and Friday; or by appointment. All exhibition events are in Faulconer Gallery in the Bucksbaum Center for the Arts, unless otherwise noted. For more information about the exhibition and related programs, call (641) 269-4660 or visit www.grinnell.edu/faulconergallery.