Last week flashnick visuals, llc had a quick trip to the “Music City” Nashville, Tennessee.  While we were there we decided to take in the sights, and spent some time at Centennial Park which is located on West End and 25th Avenue North, the 132-acre features: the iconic Parthenon.  The Parthenon was originally built for Tennessee’s 1897 Centennial Exposition as a replica of the original Parthenon in Athens, Greece.

We are now back home in Columbia South Carolina, and with the 25th Annual Greek Festival kicking off tomorrow we thought you might like to see a little slice of Greece that is just a few hours away by car (or a 45-minute flight on South West Airlines from GSP airport).

More photos and stories from our quick visit to Nashville after the jump.

While we were searching out some adventures (and trying to find a good place to catch the Georgia v. South Carolina football game), we also came across the closing weekend of the Warhol Live exhibit at the FRIST Center for the Visual Arts.  If you ever find yourself in Nashville, the FRIST is a must visit.

Here’s more on the exhibit from the FRIST’s website.

Over the course of his meteoric career, Andy Warhol (1928–1987) used the medium of music to transform himself from fan to record album designer, producer, celebrity night-clubber and rock impresario. Warhol Live presents a comprehensive exploration of the artist’s work as experienced through the lens of music and dance. This exhibition juxtaposes major pieces (Elvis, Marilyn, Liza Minnelli, Grace Jones, Mick Jagger, Debbie Harry, the Self-portraits and the Campbell’s Soup Cans) with lesser-known works inspired by music and the performing arts (album covers, illustrations, photos and Polaroids), along with films and sound recordings, which provide a visual and aural score to Warhol’s extraordinary work and life. The exhibition includes nearly 300 works, including objects and documents from the artist’s personal archives.

A few “illegal” snapshots in the gallery below.

It was pretty amazing to see the work of Andy Warhol (which we are huge fans of) up close and personal.  The exhibit wasn’t just paintings, but also included re-creations of an Exploding Plastic Inevitable installation with the Velvet Underground, 16mm films, screen tests for the Velvet Underground, and some original Polaroid Polacolor Type 108 photographs of Liza Minnelli, The Rolling Stones, Grace Jones and many others, along with some of his original album designs.

As huge photo geeks it was pretty amazing seeing some of these Polaroids up close and personal, as they were the foundation for some of his most famous pieces.  By far one of the coolest things in our photo geek minds was the ANDY WHARHOL embossing on each of them (got our wheels turning about the re-launch of our print collections coming pretty soon). It is much more understated and way cooler than today’s digital watermarking.

We were pretty inspired after leaving the exhibit, and that feeling is still with us.  So on that note, as we head out to create, we’ll leave you with this quote from Sir Isaac Newton “If I have seen further it is only by standing on the shoulders of giants.”

Snow clouds pass over the skyline of Columbia, SC, during a snow storm on December 26, 2010.

Its pretty rare for us to get snow in South Carolina, its even more rare for us to get snow twice in one year, but snow on or around Christmas here in Columbia is pretty rare.  The only time I’ve ever seen a “White Christmas” was when my family took a trip to the mountains for the holiday when I was in elementary school.  Not sure when I would ever see snow around the holidays in Columbia ever again (even though it was minimal) I took my cameras out for a ride, and this is what I saw.  See more of my images from the day after Christmas below.

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I am completely humbled that I have been selected as the Columbia Regional Visitors Center ”Artist of the Month” for November 2010. Photographic prints will be on display and available for purchase throughout the entire month of November at the Visitors Center located inside the Columbia Metropolitan Convention Center (1101 Lincoln Street).

We are kicking things off with a happy hour drop-in on Thursday, Nov. 4, 2010. Please join us for beer, wine and light hors d’oeuvres from 5:30-7:30pm at the Visitors Center in the Vista.

If you can’t make it to the happy hour, I will be at the Visitors Center all day, so feel free to stop by when you have a moment. These photographic prints make unique Christmas gifts. To help you get started with your holiday shopping all prints will be discounted 10-25% from 8:30am-7:30pm on the 4th.

Perry Dozier Jr. - Columbia, SC 2009

Looking back on my email box, I found the first correspondence letting me know that I had been selected to participate in fourth series of the Palmetto Portraits Project a year ago today.  Less than five days from now, on Wednesday, September 16, 2009, the exhibit will open to the public with a reception at MUSC’s new James B. Edwards College of Dental Medicine, located at 29 Bee St. in Charleston, SC.

The PPP was started a little over four years ago by the Medical University of South Carolina (MUSC), in partnership with the Halsey Institute of Contemporary Art at the College of Charleston, and the South Carolina State Museum.  The goal of the project was to commission approximately twenty noted and emerging photographers from across South Carolina to focus on portraying South Carolinians in the Lowcountry, the Piedmont, and the Upstate—reflecting the full range and diversity of the state’s citizens, occupations, and recreational activities. Creating a collection of art to display within MUSC’s educational and clinical buildings, the University hopes to remind students, faculty, staff, and visitors of those they serve at MUSC and throughout South Carolina. MUSC and the selected photographers have broadened the impact of the project by donating an identical set of photographs to the permanent collection of the South Carolina State Museum in Columbia.

This was an amazing project to be invited to be a part of, and am still humbled to this day to have had the opportunity to work with so many great photographers.  While the past year of my life has led me in a in a direction that I never saw coming, both personally and professionally, I am deeply thankful for the people I have had the opportunity to meet while working on it, and the new way in which it has taught me to look at my native state.  I don’t feel I can ever thank those who have supported me, and helped me with this project over the past year enough.  I will be eternally grateful to all of you!

If you don’t have the opportunity to make it to the opening on Wednesday, but find yourself in Charleston, SC the project will be hanging in James B. Edwards College of Dental Medicine, located at 29 Bee St. for the foreseeable future.  Please stop by and take a look at all of the amazing work of the series IV photographers.  It will give you a new appreciation for the people and places of this state.

for more information on this project, please visit the official project site at http://palmettoportraits.musc.edu/

*Update* Check out the review of the show in the Charleston City Paper.

My first fine art photography show Symbology, installed in the black box theatre at the Columbia Music Festival association.

As I sat on the porch where I currently live, listening to the water fall in the Koi pond, and trying to catch up on growing email inbox this morning, I ran across a facebook message from a few weeks ago that new friend and fellow artist Anastasia Chernoff sent, after visiting my photo show, the subject of that message was “The after-show glow…”  In her message she equated the emotions of putting your first show together, to giving birth to a baby (something I’ll never know about), and went on to say “…the opening night was all so beautifully surreal. An incredible high that, to this day, STILL resonates within me when I think about it.”  That last statement is something I can now completely understand though.  Now that I look back on the whole experience of my show which closed at the conclusion of the 2009 Artista Vista three weeks ago, it STILL resonates within me, and I’m sure it will continue to, for the rest of my life.  While my entire life has been a complete whirlwind for the past 3 months, filled with the stresses of work, travel, putting on my first show, and trying to buy my first home, I sit here this morning feeling the calmest, and certainly the most content I’ve been in the past 8 months, all thanks to the wonderful friends, and family who now share my life with me.

Five months ago I could never have imagined that I would find my voice as an artist in the midst of all the turmoil that was surrounding me, nor could I have hoped for the amount of support that I received in making this show a reality.  None of this would have been possible without those family and friends, both new and old, that I now treasure more than ever.  In recent months they have guided me, and supported me, through the process of this show, searching for a home, and the emotional stress of losing what I had come to think of as the most important thing in my life.  My long-term relationship with a person who I truly loved.  Now what they have helped me rebuild is even better than before.

For this reason I can’t thank my family, friends, and colleagues; Katie, J. Lee, Betsy, Chip, Lesley, Nicole, Natasha, Rich, Jay, Jody, Chris, Kim Kim, Gerry, Jeff, Meg, Jody, and last but certainly not least the Villanova crew, enough with any amount of words or deeds.  I could not have made it this far without you, and owe you far more than I could ever repay.  Also to those who found me and asked that I put this show on at the right time in my life, and offered more support and encouragement than I could have ever dreamed to help make my show a reality, the Columbia Music Festival Association, Susan & Steve, John Whitehead, Cindi Boiter, The Mouse House, The Frame Shop, Moses and the Ritz crew, everyone at Adorama Pix, for the amazing prints, thank you just isn’t enough!

A special thanks goes out to all of the following media outlets who helped me to promote the show and my work.

• Stir Magazine Vol. 5 – Click Here to read the PDF article by Cindi Boiter
• Be “Undefined” Art Blog
• Artista Vista: Views from the galleries by Otis Taylor: The State
• Renewed Energy at 2009 Artista Vista by Mary Bentz Gilkerson: The Free Times
• Art against the tide by Jeffrey Day: Carolina Culture
• Carolina Arts

A political protester grasps a confederate battle flag, outside of town hall meeting at Seawell's, in Columbia, S.C., for Republican presidential hopeful John McCain.

The proceeding statement was the founding basis for my first fine art photography show titled “Symbology,” which contains 15 16×20 format silver halide prints, from editorial images which I have created over the past decade as a freelance photojournalist.

The show will run April 23-25, 2009, at the Columbia Music Festival Association located at 914 Pulaski St. in Columbia, SC. Click Here to View a Map. 

Symbology will open with a free reception on Art Night, Thursday, April 23, 2009 from 4-9pm.

The show will continue on Friday, April 24, 2009, with gallery hours from 11am-3pm, followed by a special performance from local rock band, All Walks of Life from 7pm-Until.  Tickets for the show are $5, and can be purchased at CMFA in advance or at the door.

Gallery hours will continue on Saturday, April 25, 2009 from 11am-3pm, and will conclude with a special talk, and question and answer session from 2-3pm.

For more information on Artista Vista, Columbia’s Premier Gallery Crawl, visit their website www.artistavista.com or Click Here to download a PDF gallery map.