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A Nicholls alum and local artist aims to show the extent of land loss in Louisiana through coastal erosion.
Artist Ernest Milsted worked to create “White Boots and Black Ink: Recent Work by Ernest Milsted.”
That collection features print and mixed media works by the artist, who is a Houma native and a 2002 graduate of Nicholls.
The work will be on display throughout the month at the Ameen Art Gallery in Nicholls’ Talbot Hall.
The event is free and open to the public. The work will be available Monday, Aug. 19 and will run until Friday Sept. 6.
The gallery will be open from 9 a.m. to 4:30 p.m.
Louisiana has been ravished by coastal erosion. That’s not a new headline. It’s been happening for many years.
The state loses 25-35 square miles of wetlands per year, according to Restore or Retreat.
The highest rates occur in the Barataria and Terrebonne basins where 10-11 square miles per year are lost.
Milsted has been working over the past several years to create art and document the loss.
He said his goal is to raise awareness for the cause through his work.
“I grew up exploring the hauntingly beautiful Louisiana coastal landscape,” he said. “My goal is to promote awareness of the plight of Louisiana through the visual language of art. I intend for the work to form a loose narrative about place, time, life and death. The work will speak of man’s struggle to survive in the ephemeral landscape that exists between land and sea.”
Milsted, in part, created these works during a one-week artist’s residency at the Chauvin Sculpture Garden.
He earned a M.F.A. from the University of Notre Dame in 2006 where he received The Snite Museum of Art’s Walter R. Beardsley Award for his thesis project.
The Nicholls Alumni Federation recognized Milsted as the Outstanding Alum from the College of Arts and Sciences in 2011.
Milsted now teaches printmaking and drawing at Southeastern Louisiana University.
For more information, contact Teresa Shannon, exhibitions coordinator at 448-4595.
