Photos courtesy of Nick Cave Nick Cave, a performance artist and sculptor, will present a slide lecture about his work and a workshop on creating art with found materials.

Chicago artist Nick Cave will be fully clothed as he launches lecture series with slide presentation

It's surprising how bold, outrageous and avant-garde such a softspoken man can be. While his art screams chaos, unity, survival and oppression, Nick Cave explains his catharsis through art in what sounds like, in comparison to his daring work, a whisper.

Tonight, the Committee on Lesbian/Gay/Bisexual/Transgender studies launches its three-part lecture series, "Race, Gender, Sexuality and Identity in Visual Art," with a slide presentation by Cave, a professor at the renowned Art Institute of Chicago.

Though he shares his name with '80s rocker Nick Cave, of Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds, this Cave rocks a flourishing career as a performance artist, sculptor and innovative fashion designer. Cave studied art his whole life and devotes his work to integrating aesthetics with social issues including race, sex and sexuality ÷ or sensuality as he prefers. As an African-American, Cave roots much of his drive to create art in his race-related experiences.

"My work is about being a black male. You can see race, not sexual preference. We can all see race. Who's to say someone is bi, hetero or gay? You don't know. You know race. It's not blatant in my work, it's a reference point," he vented thoughtfully.

Cave urges all artists to find this driving factor or reference point.

"You have to have an origin to have your art solidified. Where is the center or source of what you're generating?" he asked, clearly excited to have found his center.

For Cave, "being a black male in America" generated some of the most novel, groundbreaking exhibits. His ongoing project "Sound Suits" mixes media, aesthetic values in sight and sound, fashion and social commentary. Cave said this project has changed his life.

"I have been running from this project for 12 years. I've surrendered," he admitted with a short laugh.

Though Cave designed some of these sound suits before, usually getups flaunting commonplace items like bottle caps or feather dusters, this time around, Cave will present a 90-suit line that, upon completion, will collaborate dance, theater and percussion with professionals to high school students as models and other participants.

Designers like Coach and Betsey Johnson have created a handbag or T-shirt for causes like breast cancer during Breast Cancer Awareness Month in October, but Cave leaps further than the logo tee or limited-edition purse to make his social and health concerns like AIDS pret a porter.

As Randy Gragg of The Oregonian wrote, Cave's work "naturally progressed into creating total environments." For Cave, this total environment includes visual movement, sound, and most importantly, a chance for the participants to express themselves outside the box.

"People want an independence, a sense of freedom," Cave explained in his still quiet but obviously impassioned tone.

Besides burying himself in the outfits pairing haute couture with social commentary that are "Sound Suits," Cave expresses himself through other types of artwork.

One exhibition back in 2000 at the Allentown Art Museum in Pennsylvania featured over 50 gloves Cave found on the street. He submerged each glove in a transparent resin so each glove seemed to be, as Fred Camper wrote in his essay about the exhibit, "floating in space" and "hinting at the presence of those who wore them."

By repeatedly using everyday materials like bottle caps in the sound suit or a glove found on a street, Cave elevates commonplace things to a new level while maintaining a certain level of accessibility to the viewer. Admittedly, Michelangelo's Sistine Chapel intimidates the average viewer; Cave's work ÷ impressive in its own right ÷ poses personal questions, instead of intimidating, and forces viewers to look at their piles of "junk" stored in the attic from a fresh perspective. Cave hopes that by displacing the items seen as trash into the circle of art and beauty, people will get used to taking a second look at things seen as dispensable.

"Get outside institutes and organizations. We need art to be more accessible," Cave pleaded. "I am a messenger delivering these deeds."

The deeds Cave delivers, it seems, are a sense of freedom and independence made available to the masses through heightened accessibility of his art or art.

Cave has toyed with freedom from conformity throughout his career. In his performance art, in order to shed light on androgyny and sensuality, he has shed those very suits he spent so much effort creating. One article from Fiberarts Magazine calls Cave's live art performance an "almost strip tease" that "tantalizes the audience as he dresses and undresses on stage."

Tonight though, you can expect to see a fully dressed Cave, as he plans to stick to slide images of his work. Still, he knows how to captivate students' attention.

"I've heard through many people that he is a great teacher. In addition to his lecture, Nick will lead a six-hour workshop on working with found materials and assemblage called ÎObjects/Artifacts and No Nonsense' with art students," said Harmony Hammond, UA professor of art and drawing.

"I was looking for artists who negotiate issues of race, gender, sexuality and identity," explained Hammond, a member of the executive committee for LGBT studies and coordinator of this lecture series. "The inventive use of materials, cross-cultural references and sensuality Cave offers through his art is valuable to students."

Just as UA students await his arrival from Chicago, Cave looks forward to the chance to reach students.

"I am excited to share my thoughts and bring encouragement for students to hold on to the belief of creativity as means to affect us as a nation," he said. "If I could be a part of any change, it would be unifying us as a nation more. We are so diverse but still work and living within these boundaries. I would like to build awareness that we're all experiencing this together."

If his lecture tonight focuses more on motivational speaking rather than artistic and social commentary, attendants might hear Cave emphasize that "preparation meets opportunity." This three-word mantra refers to the work involved with success in general; any opportunity one wants to seize goes hand in hand, according to Cave, with commitment.

"In that process of commitment, you'll arrive at where you want to be. Don't be afraid to embrace your passions."

Cave exemplifies fearlessness, boldly delving deep into his passions ÷ too many to count. Cave's passions to heighten awareness of the named social issues, as well as invoke social change, do not drown in his sea of artistic passions.

"To change one person is extraordinary. How can I make a contribution to change?" Cave half wondered, half knew.