Rubin Center exhibits art and music

   As UTEP prepares to celebrate its 100th year anniversary, the Stanlee and Gerald Rubin Center for the Visual Arts is also getting ready to celebrate its 10 years in 2014, marking a decade of a deep appreciation of visual and contemporary art.

The Stanlee and Gerald Rubin Center, a $2.1 million project, has not only displayed the artistic work of students and faculty members over the years, it has also gained an international reputation by showcasing well-known artists from around the world, such as Andy Warhol.

Kerry A. Doyle, recently promoted to be interim director for the center, said it is important to inform college students of the events that will happen throughout the year.

“A monthly calendar will be put up in our website starting Sept. 1. We feel that by promoting our events through social media such as Facebook, more students will be aware of the Gerald Rubin Center,” Doyle said.

Students are encouraged to “Like” the Stanlee and Gerald Rubin Center’s Facebook page in order to be up to date with the events that the center will be hosting, one of them being the Border Beat Showcase, to be held on Aug. 29 from 4-7 p.m. The event will feature a live concert along with a stencil workshop, which everyone is invited to attend.

“This will also serve as great opportunity for kids, students, faculty and staff to check out El Flow, Mark Bradford and Sean Caulfield’s exhibitions before they are taken down on Aug. 31,” Doyle said.

Doyle, along with her team, has worked for months in order to make The Border Beat Showcase a success. They used Facebook to promote the event, letting students express their opinion by voting for their favorite band to perform at the showcase.

“I’ve been up to date with the Rubin Center’s Facebook page,” said Adriana Dominguez, junior industrial engineering major. “I was able to vote for my favorite bands thanks to the poll provided on the page.”

Featured local bands included Electric Social, The D.A., Batallones Femeninos and Birth Defects, among others.

The winning poll bands scheduled to perform on Aug. 29 will be Calista, Bumpstreet Fonanza and favorite band expressed by voters, Acid Pie.

“We hope to see a lot of students attending this fun event,” Doyle said. “Something that we want to express to the students is that art is not only for art students, but for everyone that feels a deep appreciation towards it, or the want to experience art in different ways.”

According to Victoria Aviles, administrative assistant of the Stanlee and Gerald Rubin Center, Doyle has done a very effective job in promoting awareness of the center to UTEP students.

“Doyle has a lot of plans in store for this upcoming year, one of them being the Border Beat welcome back event for students, scheduled for the first week of school, our contribution on this year’s International Symposium on Electronic Art (ISEA), which explores the intersection of art, science and technology, and the other being the implementation of creating more programming,” Aviles said.

The Stanlee and Gerald Rubin Center exhibitions for this semester include recent videos from the Middle East, exploring zones of recent conflict like the Israel-Palestine border and Afghanistan. A second exhibition will feature Ivan Puig and Andres Padilla Domene, who share their journey through abandoned railroad tracks in Mexico using photography, video, audio and text.

“The Gerald Rubin Center is a visual arts center rather than a museum,” Doyle said. “We want to engage the audience in different ways such as video, audio, sculptures rather than just pictures. Our focus is where excellence meets access.”

The exhibitions will open to the public starting Sept. 13 and will be open through Dec. 21. The exhibitions are free admission.

For more information visit rubincenter.utep.edu or the Stanlee and Gerald Rubin Center’s Facebook page at facebook.com/rubincenter.

Andrea Acosta may be reached at prospector@utep.edu.