|LOCATION|

The Cress Gallery of Art is located in the lobby of the Fine Arts Center, corner of Vine and Palmetto Streets, the University of Tennessee at Chattanooga, Chattanooga, Tn.

|HISTORY|

The Cress Gallery of Art bears the name of artist and art educator George Ayers Cress, a member of the Faculty of the Department of Art, University of Tennessee at Chattanooga, from 1951 until his death on January 1, 2008. Mr. Cress remained active in his support of the Gallery and its programs throughout his career at UTC. A prolific artist throughout his life, Cress’s paintings and drawings can be found in private and public collections in the United States and Europe. On the day of his passing in a local hospital, Cress expressed how he looked forward to the first day of class and the preparations of the class syllabus for the water media course he was scheduled to teach in the coming spring semester. A memorial service held by family, friends, and former students paid tribute to Cress as mentor and friend; a memorial service held at UTC’s historic Patten Chapel acknowledged his great contribution towards the creation of a tradition of the arts on this campus and his influence upon the visual arts in the South East region.

The Cress Gallery of Art opened in the summer of 1980 with the completion of construction of the Fine Arts Center which houses the Departments of Art, Theatre and Speech, and Music. The entrance to the Gallery is located in the lobby of the Center along with those of the Roland Hayes Concert Hall and the Dorothy Ward Theatre. In its first exhibition season, the Gallery opened with “Twentieth Century American Painting: an Inaugural Exhibition for the Dorothy Patten Fine Arts Series” featuring work on loan from the Brooks Memorial Art Gallery, Memphis; The Georgia Museum of Art, Athens, The High Museum of Art, Atlanta; and the Whitney Museum of American Art, New York, by artists George Beattie, Paul Cadmus, Carroll Cloar, Ralston Crawford, Jim Dine, Lamar Dodd, Richard Estes, Adolph Gottlieb, Balcomb Greene, John Heliker, Hans Hofmann, Carl Holty, Jasper Johns, Ida Kohlmeyer, Willem de Kooning, Barry Le Va, Jacob Lawrence, David Park, Robert Rauschenberg, Larry Rivers, Mark Rothko, and Clifford Still. Since that date, the Cress Gallery has maintained a yearly schedule of traveling and temporary exhibitions featuring both historical and contemporary work created by international, national, regional, and local artists and designers. Among the artists whose work has been exhibited in the Cress Gallery are Benny Andrews, Michael Auerbach, Frank Baisden, Carl Holty, Barry Moser, Lamar Dodd, Robert Stackhouse, Robert Motherwell, Holly Roberts, Dieter Roth, Prilla Smith Brackett, Glenn Goldberg, Larry Bell, Steven Assael, Joe Ramiro Garcia, Jane Calvin, Jack Dingo Ryan, Michelle Barker, Mimi Herbert, Damir Niksic, Frank Wick, Roger Ricco, Dannielle Tegeder, Norman Lundin, Mark Andreas, [dNASAb], and Ryan Wolfe; designers include Malcolm Grear, Chris Vermaas, and Weimer Pursell.

|OPERATION|

Normal Operating Hours:

Gallery hours are 9:30am – 5:00pm Monday, Wednesday, Friday & 9:30 – 7:00 Tuseday, Thursday
The Gallery will be open at 6:30 pm for all Fine Arts Center Patten Series events.

To accomplish its goals, the exhibition series and associated activities are selected and scheduled by the Curator of Galleries, Exhibitions and Collections working in consultation with the Department of Art faculty and with others associated with educational and cultural institutions in the community. In a typical year, 7 to 8 traveling or temporary exhibitions approximately 6 to 7 weeks in length are presented in each of the two spaces that comprise the Cress Gallery of Art.

During the Fall and Spring semesters, exhibitions selected for the Main Gallery demonstrate art historical or contemporary trends. A Visiting Artists Program operates in coordination with the academic year exhibition schedule to bring exhibiting artists and designers to campus for lectures, gallery talks, workshops, classroom visits and critiques, The academic year schedule also includes an annual juried student exhbition and the senior thesis exhibitions, as well as a biennial Art Faculty exhibition.

Exhibitions in Gallery II typically feature the work of students and alumni of the Department of Art as well as the creative production and research of faculty from other University academic departments. Summer term schedules for both Cress Gallery spaces underscore the University’s relationship and role in the community with exhibitions of regional and local emphasis and interest.

The Cress Gallery is open during the regular business hours of the University of Tennessee at Chattanooga and after hours for all Dorothy Patten Fine Arts Series Performances. The Gallery closes for the installation and the dismounting of its exhibitions and for regular maintenance. It does not open during the University’s scheduled or emergency administrative closings.

|PARKING & ADMISSION|

Admission to the gallery and all gallery activities is free. All receptions and lectures are open to the public.

Gallery patrons arriving between 9:00 am and 5:00 pm may obtain a visitor’s parking pass from the UTC Parking Services Office located in the lobby of the Administrative Services Building, 600 Palmetto Street. After 5:00 pm Gallery patrons attending Artist’s lectures and receptions may park on any level of the Lupton Library parking garage, next to the Fine Arts Center on Vine Street, or in Lot 16 next to the Administrative Services Building, corner of Fortwood and Palmetto Streets. Hanidcap parking and unloading zones are available at the main entrance to the Fine Arts Center on Vine Street.

|FUNDING|

Funding for the operation and maintenance of the Cress Gallery of Art and for the exhibition and visiting artists schedule comes from an operation budget allocated to the Gallery by the University of Tennessee at Chattanooga through the Department of Art, and from the generous donations of the Friends of the Gallery.

As a part of a 501C institution, the Cress Gallery of Art is non-profit. The Gallery charges no admission for any of its events and activities and takes no commission on sales which may result from the exhibition of work in its spaces.

|DESCRIPTION|

The Gallery’s exhibition space is comprised of two units. The spacious Main Gallery is nearly square in its dimensions and is notable for its large central clerestory and wooden parquet flooring. It measures 116 running feet and contains 1,296 square feet of floor space. Gallery II, accessed only through the Main Gallery, is a smaller, more intimate space, rectangular and narrow. Gallery II measures 54 running feet with 236 square feet of floor space. Both areas are illuminated with track lighting. Smoke and heat sensors and a permanent alarm system provide security in each area.

|STAFF|

Ruth Grover, Curator of Galleries, Exhibitions, and Collections:
Directs the exhibition schedule, operation and activities of the Cress Gallery; oversees the care, circulation, rights and reproduction of the Permanent Collection of Art, and the operation, policies, and development of the Visual Resources Library for the UTC Department of Art; and coordinates the activities and development of the staff assigned to the gallery and the collections.

Associate Curator:
Directs the daily operations of the Visual Resources Library, assists the Curator with the preparation and installation of exhibitions and the care and circulation of the Permanent Collection of Art, and directs the part-time staff of student assistants assigned to the Visual Resources Library

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