The exhibition reception starts at 6 p.m.
The Venue will provide refreshments and will offer their regular selection of paintings, ceramics and jewelry for sale.
The exhibit will remain on display as part of the Venue’s gallery space for the month of September.
Venue curator Devin Colman said he is looking forward to the exhibit opening and sharing this artist’s work with the Bloomington community.
“She’s one of the icons of the local community,” Colman said.
McQueen was a staple in the community before the store opened.
She earned her undergraduate and graduate degrees in printmaking, photography and drawing from the School of Fine Arts at IU.
When asked how he found McQueen’s work to exhibit, Colman said she was a given.
“You don’t find her,” he said. “She’s there.”
The artist will be at the event to socialize and answer any questions from attendees about her work.
McQueen is an art teacher at Jackson Creek Middle School.
She retires this year, Colman said. She’s been teaching since 1985.
McQueen received two Lilly Teacher Creativity Awards and was selected as the Middle School Art Educator of the Year by the Art Education Association of Indiana.
According to the organization’s website, to be selected, the recipients had to have been a member of AEAI by Jan. 1 of the year they were nominated and must spend at least 51 percent of their working day in their job division.
“I’ve known her for years,” Colman said. Two of his children went to ?Jackson Creek.
He said her teaching style is inspirational. “She plants seeds and germinates them,” he said.
The key to this is keeping students interested. If they don’t like one art technique, Colman said, she’ll teach them another.
“She can do so many things so well,” he said. She primarily works in pastels, oils and water colors.
McQueen paints ?because she is called by the beauty of nature, according to her website.
She described her work as “intuitive” because the actual activity of painting comes from within.
“I enjoy flowing between the natural landscape and the inner world of abstract expression,” she said.
McQueen lives in the forest in southern Indiana, and its inspiration can be seen in her work.
Her studio is in southern Monroe county.
Commonly, she works in landscape paintings. Her subjects are organic, with many subdued colors ?presented.
“She actually is very diverse,” he said. Her style has a prominent spiritual style. Her studies trace back to Buddhism.
“She has a serenity about her,” he said. “It shows in her painting. It shows in her entire personality.”
