FLORENCE – The art galleries of Francis Marion University will display three exhibits beginning in January.

From Jan. 16 through March 2, glasswork from One Eared Cow Glass and photos by Ann Lane will be displayed in the Hyman Fine Arts Center galleries. From Jan. 23 through March 16, paintings by Mana Hewitt will be exhibited in the Smith University Center gallery. All three exhibits are open from 8:30 a.m. to 5 p.m., Monday through Friday, and are free and open to the public.

One Eared Cow Glass is one of only two working glass studios in South Carolina, offering a rare opportunity for visitors to see skilled craftsmen using the techniques and tools of an art form dating back thousands of years. At the Columbia studio, visitors can watch molten glass that has been heated to 2,400 degrees, blown and shaped into a work of art. The studio was founded in 1992 by three young art graduates from the University of South Carolina.

Lane’s “Impressions of Mexico” exhibit includes photos taken in San Miguel de Allende, a colonial city designated as a national monument by the Mexican government. Lane has been visiting and photographing Mexico since 1991. Many of the photographs in the exhibit were taken in September and October 2000 during celebrations. Lane is a resident of Marion and retired in 1997 after working for 27 years at Wellman Inc. in Johnsonville.

Hewitt is gallery director and an instructor in the Department of Art at the University of South Carolina. “My paintings stem from three areas of interests: the figure, the use of a metallic surface as illumination, and a fascination with body decoration,” she said. “Thus my work becomes a synthesis of these elements. In turn, this allows me to explore body decoration as symbolic of individual mythology and light as created by surface.”

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