Jeff Sippel

Jeff Sippel, associate professor of art at the University of Missouri-St. Louis, is an internationally renowned printmaker, but he was most recently honored for his use of a different medium: drawing. Sippel was one of 10 artists worldwide, and the only American, to receive award recognition for the fourth International Drawing Competition.

His work was chosen from 724 pieces by 274 artists from 21 countries. “Rising Fish” and “The Visitor,” two toner on mylar images by Sippel, are on display now through Jan. 10 in the Old City Hall — Municipal Museum of Wroclaw in Poland.

“It is a most honorable reward to receive this prestigious honor on an international stage,” said Sippel, of Ballwin, Mo. “Although I’m primarily recognized as a printmaker, to be granted such an award for drawing makes this even more honorable for me personally. It also gives direct credibility to the close association and cross disciplinary fields that printmaking and drawing share.”

Plans also are in the works for a catalog publication of the drawings and the exhibit to travel to other museums in Europe.

Sippel’s work has been featured in 17 solo and more than 200 group exhibitions over the course of a 25-year career. His work is represented in public collections on three continents, including the Bibliotheque Nationale de France in Paris, Smithsonian National Museum of Art in Washington, D.C., Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art in Kansas City, Mo., and the University of Cape Town, South Africa.