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The first exhibit in Martin Methodist College’s Barton Art Gallery for the 2012-13 academic year focuses on the work of a Pulaski resident who is a member of the art faculty at Athens State University in nearby Athens, Ala.

Pamela Keller’s exhibit, “Retrospective/Introspection,” is on display in the Barton Gallery, which is located on the second floor of the Gault Fine Arts Center, through the month of September. The exhibition consists of photographs, paintings and drawings completed over the last 52 years with an emphasis in work finished this summer.

An opening reception will be held at 7 p.m. on Tuesday, Sept. 11. The public is invited, and admission to the art gallery is free.

Keller, professor of art, has worked for Athens State since 1981 and is also the head of the visual arts department at the new Alabama Center for the Arts in Decatur, Ala.

“My work is narrative,” Keller said. “In each piece is there is a story. The paintings and drawings tell the more personal stories. For example, I was adopted; my children fascinate me visually because they are biological. I am introspective but with good humor. I study religion as a hobby. I practice spirituality. I get energy from the farm. I love making marks like the tiny stitches of lap work from the 19^th century. 

“The photographs tell my aesthetic stories. I love the overlap of pattern and texture. I’m a color synesthete, movement, balance, contrast and unity in composition are my passions,” she said.

“It is my hope that, regardless of the narrative or subject matter, the expression of my sensations are complex enough artistically, in terms of form, that they will be surprising and interesting and generate sensations and even thought in the viewer.”

Keller moved to Giles County in 1981 after graduating from Indiana University, John Herron School of Art, and the University of Wisconsin where her majors were painting and drawing and her minors included photography, art history and English.

Her work has since been exhibited in a number of regional and national shows, including:

Art of the State, Tennessee Valley Art Association in Tuscumbia, Ala.; Alabama’s Finest in Gadsden, Ala.; Tennessee All-State Exhibition in Nashville; Central South Art Exhibition in Nashville; and Arts Alive Exhibition at the Kennedy-Douglas Center in Florence, Ala.

She is held in many private collections, some of whom have lent work to this exhibition. Her work has also been collected by: the City of Pulaski; Giles County; Eastman Kodak Pharmaceutical Corp. in Malvern, Pa.; Third National Bank in Nashville; Hunter Museum of Art in Chattanooga, Tenn.; Helen Keller Memorial Hospital in Tuscumbia, Ala; and the Family Mental Health Institute in New York.

Locally, Keller is known for having created the Dr. Angie Aymett Tucker Bronze Fountain Memorial, the Trail of Tears Monument in Bronze at Pleasant Run Park, and the bronze portrait busts in the rotunda of the Giles County Courthouse.