Prints From Master Wood Engraver to Be Shown at Gallery

The Gallery at Penn College, located on the third floor of Pennsylvania College of Technology's Madigan Library, will host "Works From Wood," an exhibit by master wood engraver Raymond Gloeckler, from Jan. 23 to Feb. 18.

An opening reception for the exhibit will take place from 3:30 to 7 p.m. on Tuesday, Jan. 23, featuring a lecture on wood engraving at 4 p.m. by David M. Moyer, instructor of graphic design. Following the opening, gallery hours are Sunday, 1 to 4 p.m.; Tuesday and Thursday, 2 to 8 p.m.; and Wednesday and Friday, 11 a.m. to 5 p.m. All exhibits are free and open to the public.

Gloeckler is an emeritus professor of art at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, where he taught relief printmaking for 35 years. Born in 1928, Gloeckler is a nationally recognized leader in the field of woodcuts and, as one of only a few masters of the craft in the United States, has played a key role in preserving it in this country.

His whimsical and satirical imagery commonly depicts animals personified to exhibit human-like character. His work is essentially humanist, though sometimes religious in nature.

"In a culture of excess, media hype, relative values and high tech, the woodcut provides a refreshing clarity too often abandoned for more seductive media," Gloeckler says. "It offers a center point, a reality that?s rock solid, deep-rooted and enduring. What is, is."

Gloeckler has exhibited his paintings and prints extensively and has won more than 100 awards. His works are included in the permanent collections of the Butler Institute of American Art, the Philadelphia Museum of Art, the Smithsonian Institution, the Detroit Art Museum, the Boston Museum of Fine Arts, the University of Hawaii and the Cincinnati Art Museum, among others.

He has shown his work regularly in national and international competitive exhibitions and has had numerous one-person shows. He is an invited member of the British Society of Wood Engravers, exhibiting his woodcuts and engravings with them annually throughout England.

Gloeckler earned his bachelor's and master's degrees in 1950 and 1952 from the University of Wisconsin, where he first enrolled in its pharmacy program. Within a year, he changed his major to art education, focusing first on painting and later shifting to printmaking.

In addition to his long teaching career at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, he also taught at Eastern Michigan University, Flint (Mich.) Community College and the University of Wisconsin-Oshkosh.

For more information about The Gallery at Penn College, call (570) 320-2445, send e-mail or visit online.