The work of UNL alumnus T.L. Solien (MFA 1977) is on display this summer at Sheldon Museum of Art.
"T.L. Solien: Toward the Setting Sun," a touring exhibition organized by Plains Art Museum in Fargo, N.D., is on display through Aug. 31.
The exhibition features mixed media works on paper and oil paintings. Known for cartoon-like and surreal imagery with references to art and cultural history, Solien explores his life, mind, and emotional states as modern man, artist, husband, and father.
In this exhibition Solien extends the reach of the Melville novel, "Moby Dick," transmuting its figures and themes into a meditation on American restlessness and on the major American historical narrative of the settling of the West. He moves the themes of the novel from their basis in adventures on the high seas and Massachusetts whaling towns to the American West.
"T. L. Solien: Toward the Setting Sun," is the first major exhibition of this dazzling new body of work, presenting works on paper and large paintings. The exhibition will be accompanied by a 140-page catalog produced by the Plains Art Museum.
Solien is Professor of Painting and Drawing at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. He received his Bachelor of Arts from Moorhead State University in Minnesota.
Solien’s work has been visible in more than 35 solo exhibitions in the last 25 years, and was the subject of a 25-year retrospective titled "T.L. Solien: Myths and Monsters," organized by the Madison Museum of Contemporary Art in Madison, Wisc.