DANBURY, CONN. — Richard Klein, exhibitions director of the Aldrich Contemporary Art Museum in Ridgefield and a professional artist renowned for his visionary use of found objects in his works, will discuss his sculptures and creative process in a talk to be presented at 6:30 p.m. on Thursday, Nov. 10, 2016, at Western Connecticut State University.

Klein’s presentation, offered as part of the Gallery Talk series sponsored by the WCSU Department of Art, will be in the Art Gallery of the Visual and Performing Arts Center on the university’s Westside campus, 43 Lake Ave. Extension in Danbury. Admission will be free and open to the public, and advance reservations to attend the talk are requested; reservations may be made online by accessing the VPAC events web page at www.wcsuvpac.eventbrite.com. Donations to sustain the Art Department’s gallery exhibition program will be accepted.

Klein’s current exhibition at the WCSU Art Gallery, “The Same Glass, Twice,” will continue through Sunday, Dec. 11. Gallery hours are from noon to 4 p.m. Tuesday through Thursday and from 1 to 4 p.m. Saturday and Sunday; admission is free and open to the public.

Klein, a New Jersey native who now resides in Norwalk, has exhibited across the United States and internationally at galleries including the Neuberger Museum of Art at SUNY Purchase; Hales Gallery in London, England; the Portland (Oregon) Institute of Contemporary Art; the Tufts University Art Gallery in Medford, Massachusetts; Caren Golden Fine Art in New York; the John Michael Kohler Arts Center in Sheboygan, Wisconsin; and Gavlak Gallery in Palm Beach, Florida. His works also are held in many public and private collections including the Connecticut Artists Collection, the Norton family collection in California, and the DeCordova Sculpture Park and Museum in Massachusetts. As curator at the Aldrich Museum, he has organized more than 80 exhibitions of works by leading contemporary artists.

Klein has received critical acclaim as a sculptor for his intensely personal and boldly creative assembly of commonplace found objects — from eyeglass frames and lenses to ashtrays, drinking glasses, and photographs — into complex sculptural constructions. Artist and writer Bill Barrette has observed that Klein gives artistic expression to complex themes through everyday items, with special emphasis on exploring the many-faceted properties of glass. “His signature materials are common eyeglasses and sunglasses soldered into biomorphic abstractions that suggest all manner of natural and otherworldly forms and phenomena,” Barrette wrote. These and other found objects are “masterfully employed to create the evanescent symmetries of his sculpture,” he added.

Among the works featured in Klein’s exhibition at Western are “Coke vs. Pepsi” and “Holiday Inn (Beirut),” works that provide artistic expression to his interests in popular culture, geopolitics and social commentary. The exhibition also includes “St. John the Baptist,” a sculpture constructed from scores of eyeglass frames, sunglass lenses, an ashtray and a liquor decanter shaped like the Liberty Bell. “The dazzling visual effect of the assemblage is reminiscent of an elaborate contemporary reliquary in which the sacred and the profane shamelessly co-habit,” Barrette said.

For more information, contact the Department of Art at (203) 837-8403 or the Office of University Relations at (203) 837-8486.

Western Connecticut State University offers outstanding faculty in a range of quality academic programs. Our diverse university community provides students an enriching and supportive environment that takes advantage of the unique cultural offerings of Western Connecticut and New York. Our vision: To be an affordable public university with the characteristics of New England’s best small private universities.