(Posted November 13, 2001)

HUNTINGDON, Pa. -- Writer Debra DiBlasi and mixed-media artist Sharyn O'Mara collaborate on a thematic art installation at the Juniata College Museum of Art that combines the use of text, photographic images, sound and other elements in an exhibition titled "Translation," which runs from Nov. 16 to Feb. 2, 2002.

A reception for the exhibition will be held from 7 to 8:30 p.m. Nov. 16 at the museum. The reception is free and open to the public.

According to the artists, "Translation" seeks to create an audible and visual translation of memory. The installation also interweaves these impressions of memory through a specific sense of place by combining images, sounds and text to create the sense that the viewer is following the cycle of a life -- from childhood memories to maturity.

Debra DiBlasi is a published writer and screenwriter, whose work includes "Drought & Say What You Like," which received the Thorpe Menn Book Award, as well as a new novel "What the Body Requires." She received the Cinavision Screenwriting Award for the short film "Drought."

"I wish to create in fiction a sublime architecture of the mind," DiBlasi writes in her notes on the exhibition.

Sharyn O'Mara's artworks have been created in a variety of media. Many of her installations and individual artworks incorporate language and text within the piece. "Written language has altered our interactions with one another and our surroundings," O'Mara says in her exhibit notes. "I began to question the impact of language on emotion, intuition and experience."

She is associate professor of art at the Tyler School of Art at Temple University in Philadelphia.

The Juniata College Museum of Art is located in historic Carnegie Hall at 17th and Moore streets in Huntingdon. Museum hours are Monday through Friday, 10 a.m. to 4 p.m., and Saturday, noon to 4 p.m. Summer hours are Wednesday through Friday noon to 4 p.m. starting in May. For more information, please call the museum at (814) 641-3505, or visit the Juniata College Web site at http://www.juniata.edu/museum.

Contact April Feagley at feaglea@juniata.edu or (814) 641-3131 for more information.