Mennello Museum of American Art

Join University of Central Florida, SVAD professor, Dr. Keri Watson for a presentation on the eeriness and unease of photographer on display, William Eggleston.

In 1969 Walker Evans famously remarked that “color photography is vulgar,” to which William Eggleston replied, “The world is in color and there’s nothing we can do about it.” Eggleston, known for his early and emphatic use of the dye-transfer process to achieve super-saturated color images, has captured everything from red ceilings to black ovens to green bathtubs. His photographs, which emphasize color as form, force the viewer to see the world in a new way and to recognize photographs as objects, but they are also unsettling. Following the tradition of Southern Gothic literature, Eggleston’s photographs appear on the surface to be ordinary suburban scenes: backyards, barbecues, and tricycles, but behind them lurks an eerie uneasiness, a sense of foreboding and longing that strikes at the heart and psyche of the viewer.

Keri Watson joined the faculty at the University of Central Florida in 2014, having taught previously at Ithaca College, Auburn University at Montgomery, and the Savannah College of Art and Design-Atlanta. The recipient of three National Endowment for the Arts grants, an Institute of Museum and Library Services grant, and a Fulbright Fellowship to teach American Art History at the China Academy of Art in Hangzhou, she specializes in twentieth-century American art and literature and the history of photography. She has contributed essays to publications including: Eudora Welty, Whiteness, and Race; the Journal of Museum Education; Disability and Art History; and Mosaic: A Journal for the Interdisciplinary Study of Literature; and regularly presents her work at the College Art Association, the Southeastern College Art Conference, and the American Literature Association.

Admission: $5
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