telfairstudio-760x452.jpg
Olivia DrakeSeptember 26, 20164min
Although Professor of Art Tula Telfair's hyper-realistic landscape paintings are vividly detailed, the scenes she depicts are not found in nature; they are conjured from memory and imagination. Informed by her experiences growing up on four continents, Telfair produces fantastical visions with delicate brushstrokes and a mastery of color and light. Suggestive of waterfalls in Africa, deserts of the American Southwest, and ice floes in Antarctica, Telfair's art draws attention to the power and fragility of nature. Telfair's art, which has been featured in public collections around the world, will be showcased in a new book, Invented Landscapes, released on Oct. 18…

tulagallery2-760x427.jpg
Olivia DrakeJanuary 8, 20152min
Tula Telfair, professor of art, is having a solo exhibition of 21 new monumental oil paintings at the Louisiana Art & Science Museum Jan. 10 through March 15. The opening reception is 6 to 8 p.m. Jan. 29. In a "World of Dreams— New Landscape Paintings," Telfair paints monumental landscapes and epic-scale vistas that act as windows into another world — a dream world — where everything seems familiar yet remains beyond grasp. Drawing upon the long tradition of landscape painting from the backdrops of the Renaissance through the Romanticism of the 19th century, she presents a thoroughly contemporary perspective upon an archaic art form. Instead of documenting…

tulagallery1-760x793.jpg
Olivia DrakeDecember 10, 20144min
#THISISWHY (by Christine Foster. Originally published in Wesleyan Magazine, Dec. 10, 2014) Professor of Art Tula Telfair’s epic and massive landscape paintings fill the walls of Wesleyan’s Ezra and Cecile Zilkha Gallery. They call forth our memories of the most stunning scenic vistas­—craggy mountains topped by threatening clouds; impossibly moist, green valleys; icebergs jutting hundreds of feet out of the freezing aqua waters below. From a distance, they appear to be photographs, but they aren’t. These views don’t even exist, except in Telfair’s mind and on her canvases. Still—even knowing they are imagined— the viewer is tempted to look for signs of…

art_pai_2014-0917135938-760x507.jpg
Olivia DrakeSeptember 17, 20142min
"A World of Dreams—New Landscape Paintings" by Professor of Art Tula Telfair will be on exhibit through Dec. 7 at the Ezra and Cecile Zilkha Gallery. "A World of Dreams" includes new large-scale paintings in which Telfair presents monumental landscapes and epic-scale vistas that are simultaneously awe-inspiring and intimate. This is her second exhibition in the Zilkha Gallery. Read more about the exhibit here. The exhibit's opening reception was held Sept. 16 at the gallery. (Photos by Dat Vu '15) (more…)

telfairmountains1-760x309.jpg
Olivia DrakeSeptember 10, 20143min
"A World of Dreams—New Landscape Paintings" by Professor of Art Tula Telfair will be on exhibit Sept. 16 through Dec. 7 at the Ezra and Cecile Zilkha Gallery. The exhibit's opening reception will be held 5 to 6:30 p.m. Sept. 16 at the gallery. "A World of Dreams" includes new large-scale paintings in which Telfair presents monumental landscapes and epic-scale vistas that are simultaneously awe-inspiring and intimate. She combines stillness with motion, solitude with universality, and definition with suggestion in her bold and quiet works. This is her second exhibition in the Zilkha Gallery. All paintings are oil on canvas. "The work…

Olivia DrakeJuly 9, 20121min
Rick Davidman '84 is hosting the opening of an exhibition of Tula Telfair's paintings on July 26. Telfair, professor of art, is known for her large oil paintings that combine images of epic landscape and dramatic weather with minimal elements of pure color. The opening will take place from 6 to 8 p.m. in the lobby of the Condé Nast Building at 4 Times Square, New York City. Admission is free and wine and hors d'ouerves will be served. For info and to RSVP, contact Rick Davidman '84 at rick@dfngallery.com. Telfair's web site can be viewed here.

Olivia DrakeMay 27, 20123min
Three Wesleyan faculty received The Binswanger Prize for Excellence in Teaching during the 2012 Commencement on May 27. The Binswanger Prize was inaugurated in 1993 as an institutional recognition of outstanding faculty members. The award is made possible by gifts from the family of the late Frank G. Binswanger Sr., HON '85 The standards and criteria for the annual prizes shall be excellence in teaching, as exemplified by commitment to the classroom and student accomplishment, intellectual demands placed on students, lucidity, and passion. Recommendations may be based on any of the types of teaching that are done at the university…

Lauren RubensteinFebruary 13, 20123min
Professor of Art Tula Telfair’s latest exhibition, Out of Sight: Imaginary Landscapes, opened at the Forum Gallery in New York, N.Y. on Jan. 5 to a packed crowd. The 15 large panoptic paintings shown in the exhibition, which ran through Feb. 11, depict majestic mountainous landscapes dominated by dramatic skies that reflect a broad range of locations and weather patterns. As with Telfair’s past work, her landscapes are derived from memory and imagination. Telfair, director of Wesleyan’s Arts Studio Program, finds it fascinating when people tell her they can identify a particular location, since none actually exist. “Since I have…

Olivia DrakeJanuary 19, 20102min
Oil paintings by Tula Telfair, professor of art, will be on display at the Florence Griswold Museum April 24 through June 27. Telfair's exhibit is titled "Landscapes in Counterpoint." The Griswold Museum is located at 96 Lyme Street in Old Lyme, Conn. The exhibition pairs nine new monumental paintings by the artist with her selection of 19th and early 20th-century paintings from the museum's collection. Telfair's choices, which include works by Thomas Cole and Frederic E. Church, establish the visual foundation for, as well as a counterpoint to, her own large-scale landscapes-paintings that are informed by both tradition and imagination.…

Olivia DrakeMay 2, 20057min
  Above, Tula Telfair, professor of art, sits near her students' work inside her office in Art Studio South. At right, Telfair's oil on canvas, "Obscured to the Eye Apparent on the Map," measures 79 by 100 inches.   Posted 05/02/05 Many people who see Tula Telfair’s landscape painting titled “To Make Space Distant,” are confident the artist painted a place familiar to them. However, before she painted it, the grassy field, split by a pond highlighted in fire brush existed nowhere but in Telfair’s mind. It’s part of a world that the professor of art at Wesleyan creates from…