A West Virginia University faculty member is preparing a sculpture exhibition for a conference next year in New Orleans, thanks to a prestigious $3,000 fellowship.

Jason Leesculptor, assistant professor and foundations coordinator in the WVU Division of Art in the College of Creative Artswas recently named the winner of the Southeastern College Art Conference (SECAC) Artists Fellowship during the organizations annual meeting in Charleston.

Lee was selected from 56 applicants. Besides having his work showcased at the conference, he will be featured in The SECAC Review, an annual journal that presents research in the visual arts.

The WVU sculptor constructs seamlessly crafted light boxes and arranges them in multiples. The boxes display photographic images of idealized suburban landscapes. Lee plans to use the fellowship award for the construction of a dozen additional modular landscape installations.

Lee has shown his work in regional and national shows. Recent group exhibitions have been installed at UB Anderson Gallery in Buffalo, N.Y.; Gallery 324 in Cleveland; the Reinberger Gallery at The Cleveland Institute of Art; and the Cleveland Museum of Art. He received his Master of Fine Arts degree in sculpture from the University of Wisconsin-Madison in 1998.

The SECAC is a nonprofit organization that seeks to promote the visual arts in higher education. The group facilitates cooperation and fosters ongoing dialogue about pertinent creative, scholarly and educational issues among teachers and administrators in universities, colleges, community colleges, professional art schools and museums. The organization represents artists from Alabama, Arkansas, Florida, Georgia, Kentucky, Louisiana, Mississippi, North Carolina, South Carolina, Tennessee, Virginia and West Virginia. It also has members from across the United States and abroad.

The fellowship is one of several annual awards made to SECAC members for distinguished service and contribution to the arts and to the organization. It was established in 1981 to support member artists, further their creative growth and help them develop new ideas for exhibitions and creative projects.