2021 Art Department Senior Exhibition

KUTZTOWN UNIVERSITY

ART DEPARTMENT SENIOR

EXHIBITION

APRIL 16 - 26, 2021

ART DEPARTMENT SENIOR

EXHIBITION

Juried by Margaret Winslow

APRIL 16 - 26, 2021

The Marlin and Regina Miller Gallery

KUTZTOWN UNIVERSITY

Photo By Luigi Ciuffetelli for the Delaware Business Times

The works of art included in the 2021 Senior Art Exhibition in Kutztown University’s Marlin & Regina Miller Gallery represent a range in style, subject matter, and media. There are meticulous lines; colorful, expressionist drawings; ominous figures; and meditations on nature. When making these selections, I strove to identify works of the highest quality in regard to both form and content. Similarly, I paid equal attention to all the various media I found represented—drawing, printmaking, painting, sculpture, photography, and performance.

While the included artwork is representative of the myriad styles and themes occupying the collective conscious today, there is an underlying current, that of presence and absence. Such a phenomenon is unsurprising, given the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on nearly every system, structure, and experience today. We are faced with new accessories and stipulations while longing for spaces we can no longer inhabit and opportunities no longer afforded.

Danielle Schwesinger's Aseptic Chamber considers the body and its natural barriers like skin and cilia.

They are insubstantial against an invasive virus and protective layers, often faulty, must be added.

In her photographs, Adapt to your Environment I and II, Shawna Lee underscores the alterations we put on—camouflage added for self-preservation, a filter through which an individual is seen.

Chris Mott’s photography series, House of Silence, illustrates loss, an outline and endless landscape creating the absence of the figure. The wire framework in Jocelyn Belisle’s The break-down of old systems indicates deterioration, a structural failure. Though looming fear seems to be a constant—as illustrated in Alexis Greber’s Abstract 27—there are moments of hope and beauty in nature—captured in Elise Serrecchia’s Bent Bark— and in ourselves, shown in Kylisha Roberts’ portrait, Shalissa. The resulting exhibition showcases the perseverance of art to communicate our deepest fears, most urgent concerns, and unbridled joy.

Margaret Winslow Curator of Contemporary Art Delaware Art Museum

JOCELYN BELISLE Street Crete : This cycle of work is an exploration devoted to examining time, spaces, and permanence. As a visual artist, observation and interaction with the world around me are an important part of my studio practice. The physical world offers a myriad of materials and forms that can be mixed and matched infinitely. I seek new meaning through new combinations of color, form, and space.

I pull my inspiration from the streets. In the time I have spent in urban environments, I have developed an appreciation for the effect that time and humanity have on its physical landscape.

As I work, I make marks, brushstrokes, and place color in a thoughtful and deliberate manner to provide evidence of the busy environment, in which these objects live. I find great beauty in the exchange and transfer of materials left behind on curbs, balusters, and jersey barriers along busy thoroughfares. An object is simply static until acted upon and altered by people and its environment. With the passing of time, every mark made is an indicator of the object’s evolution and a testimony to its permanence.

The bold graphics in my printmaking are informed by my experience in punk and skate culture. The contrasting and repetitive patterning is a common thread through all disciplines in which I work. These graphics and a counter-intuitive use of materials aid in the manipulation of the viewer’s senses through a juxtaposition of appearance and reality.

The break-down of old systems, 2021 Concrete, steel, charcoal, 29" x 29" x 4"

JOCELYN BELISLE

Nug-01, 2021 Concrete, paper, ink, 12” x 14” x 11”

JOCELYN BELISLE

Nug-03, 2021 Concrete, paper, ink, 15” x 18” x 12”,

KRISTY BELL Kristy Bell enjoys peering into the dark shadows and crevasses, seeking out the things often overlooked in the hustle and bustle of everyday life. She finds the corner-of-the-eye things; objects half- seen just around that corner, glimpsed for a split second in a flash of lightning, reflected in the mirror, or breathing in the darkness, captures them with pencil or carving tools and holds them hostage on paper or canvas.

Currently working primarily with linocut, her epic mazes explore oblique pathways with fine barriers and multidirectional patterns, and her precisely carved depictions of organic objects are simultaneously unsettling and comforting. Hand-printing these reliefs with earth-toned inks gives her lines a natural depth that anchors the images to the paper.

By manipulating natural elements and combining them with man-made items she coaxes the hidden into the light, distorts reality, disrupts our sense of what is and replaces what we know to be real with a narrative where fact coexists with fiction.

“All things bright and beautiful, All creatures great and small, All things wise and wonderful, The Lord God made them all. /The tall trees in the greenwood, the meadows where we play, The rushes by the water, We gather every day. / He gave us eyes to see them, and lips that we might tell, How great is God Almighty, Who has made all things well.” -- All Things Bright and Beautiful, verses 1, 6, and 7 by Cecil Francis Alexander, 1848 Chaos Theory, 2021 Linocut- Ink on Mulberry Paper, 23” x 17”

KRISTY BELL

Kitten Dreams, 2018 Etching- Ink on German Etching Paper, 23.5” x 8.75”

KELLEY FINLEY My artwork is rooted in balancing the strength of materials like cement and delicately incorporating them into the fragility of sheer materials. My choice in materials is largely based upon how they will interact and contradict one another. I am interested in portraying my personal experiences as a biracial woman in a subtle and vulnerable way. Much of my artwork is delicate and can be easily broken because of the fabric that I use to make up the core of the piece. My identity as a mixed individual has been met with endless stereotypes and slurs. This body of work represents the pressure I felt to assume a fully white identity as many have come across me and tried to erase my Asian ethnicity. The appearance of my work is very simplified and could even be said to be “white-washed” as that has been a pressure that has been placed upon me. This work abstractly symbolizes the fragility of my cultural identity represented through the sheer and delicate fabrics and the strength it takes to hold onto my biracial identity through the cement and plaster utilized.

Chained To Being Yellow, 2019 Projection of a mask made out of plaster and yellow chains, 48" x 40" x 18"

KELLEY FINLEY

Untitled, 2021 Plaster and Concrete, 10" x 14" x 72"

EMMA FRIES Ecosystems hold a level of connectivity unparalleled by any other hierarchy of organization. Linked together by so many strings of vitality, an entire ecosystem could collapse with the alteration or elimination of one of its parts. My art draws inspiration from this connectivity and the sense of resilience it has come to embody through the natural rhythms of life.

Large scale paintings and prints have allowed me to create images derived from these patterns and observations within nature. Many of the materials I have obtained come from birdwatching across the United States as well as research and exploration in the fields of water conservation and preservation.

In my senior semester of college, an injury to my hand and arm drove me to explore the same concepts of connectivity and resilience first hand. Working to compensate for the inability to use my right hand, I have made adaptations to my art making process by adopting a language of abstract lines and markmaking while retaining the color pallet and atmosphere of interrelatedness that marked my original body of work.

Through creating pieces that emulate patterns within our ecosystem, I hope to bring awareness to both the fragility and strength that govern the future of resources we depend upon.

Tributary, 2021 Oil on Canvas, 19" x 26"

EMMA FRIES

Resilience, 2021 Watercolor on Paper, 54" x 48"

MADIE GOTSHALL

Using contemporary disciplines, I create work that replicates interpretations of the human condition, specifically how unavoidable circumstance impacts individual psyche. Much of my work concentrates on liminality and allows interaction with pieces to evoke contemplation and mindfulness. The body of work is a visual journal of personal growth and a means of coping with various struggles. At first, concepts were generalized and broad to encompass a large span of ideas. As I evolve my work, I become more vulnerable to my audience and create more specific pieces pertaining to life events rather than escaping via vague ideas such as liminality as a whole. This idea is experienced through infinite situations and reaches every potential audience member, as liminality is faced in all walks of life physically and emotionally. An area between unconsciousness and consciousness is explored to simulate a variety of conditions where things can exist and be incomprehensible instantaneously creating an ethereal presence.

By creating various forms of soft sculptures, I use soft materials to discuss hard topics. The need to touch is encouraged in my work and creates physical comfort by using stuffing in many of my works. Repetition of color and shape combined with overlapping elements provides familiarity and cohesion. With installation pieces, I explore how the physical comfort and discomfort directly affect the mental state of my participants. Monumental scale in the installation works demonstrate the inevitability of transformation. The element of softness is vital padding and protection against the unpleasant certainties of existence and is shared with the audience, reassuring survival.

Ordinary, mundane happenings to distressing, life-altering occurrences are on a level playing field in my work, illuminating the complexity and range of human emotion and instinctive responses. Sustainability of life requires some sort of compartmentalization of the negatives and light of the positives. I use self-actualization to find ease and understanding of personal tension as a means of healing not only for myself, but also for viewers. This spans from childhood events to discovering comfort and reassurance in the modern world overflowing with ambiguity.

7:24, 2020 Concrete, Mixed Fibers, 54" x 48"

MADIE GOTSHALL

Fault, 2020 Acrylic Yarn Tapestry, 14" x 8"

ALEXIS GREBER My paintings aim to express a looming presence of generational fear by constructing surreal environments that foreshadow the future. In these works, I refer to shapes familiar to me, from cartoons between the late 1990s and early 2010s. The references of cartoon imagery represent both a safety from and an insight into man-made destruction and natural disasters creating post-apocalyptic wastelands. By pushing these shapes into abstraction, I am connecting with the act of free association and the wildness of imagination. The color palette in my paintings speaks to a collision of nature and toxicity. I want to highlight the effect of nature and chemicals mixing through the paintings’ surface which replicates plastic, chemical, and earth-like textures. Growing up as an only child has given me a youthful creative process that embraces the spontaneous and the improvised. Each piece is meant to stand on its own and with my lack of titles, I invite viewers into a space where they can have their own experience and interpretation.

Abstract 27, 2021 Acrylic on Canvas, 12" x 24" x 1"

ALEXIS GREBER

Abstract 28, 2021 Acrylic on Canvas, 12" x 24" x 1"

LEXIE KOCH Ceramic objects are most genuinely experienced through use, caressed by the hands that are pouring, sipping, washing, opening, or serving with them; their demeanor is greatly altered when cast aside during periods of rest.

Each piece I make is intended to fulfill a particular need, to encourage some new physical interaction between the viewer and a pot. How is a pitcher more than just another item when it is not able to hold and share its contents? A pitcher can still provide a person with its presence, and sometimes that is enough of a purpose. My work is functional because the practice of making ceramic pieces is one rooted in interactions and human experience. It is fulfilling on a primitive level, to the mind and body, to cradle a warm bowl and bring it to one’s lips.

The hands and mind are working together to meet the needs of the body while simultaneously enjoying the heat and texture that the bowl offers the consumer.

To keep the attention on the intimate relationship between the person and pot, I want the experience to be an effortless transition from an empty to a full hand. The ceramic pieces I make are a mix of unassuming, singlehand pots to formidable forms of about torso size, but no matter the size, they are trying to encourage wandering fingers to explore their surfaces. My work maintains a thoughtful approach to surface design while utilizing refined forms to invite the viewer to engage with them. However, my pieces, just as those from antiquity, crave the interaction of a person using them to enhance their own sense of identity and purpose in the world.

Tray Set, 2020-2021 Cone 6 Stoneware, 16.5" x 6.75" x 10"

LEXIE KOCH

Spiky Vase, 2020 Cone 6 Stoneware, 20" x 12.5" x 12.5"

SHAWNA LEE Utilizing photography’s inherent ability to capture the reality of a scene, I pose and manipulate a studio setting to reflect the inner emotional or psychological states of mind surrounding mental health issues.

Constructing elaborate sets, I implement lighting techniques such as spot lights and projections to overlay and distort the human form in an effort to translate deep seeded or hidden emotions. Through highly intentional choices of background, wardrobe and props I use color and staging to narrate the varying individual responses to the inner battles someone may be fighting.

I try to always say something important with my work and tell the story of people who may not have the voice to do so. I have done series on, mental health, addiction, homelessness, and body positivity. I want my viewer to be able to relate to my work, and for the viewers who can’t, at least feel a respect and empathy for the experience. Sometimes, my work has different meanings to different people, which is a beautiful thing, and something I strive for.

I have chosen to tackle all of these topics because I have had personal connections with many people who struggle with these issues and I want them to know that they are not alone and that there is always someone, somewhere that cares about them. I create art to tell a story, a story that maybe you have not heard, or maybe you knew nothing about because you just have not experienced it.

Edible Woman, 2019 Inkjet Print on Paper, 22" x 7"

SHAWNA LEE

Adapt to your Environment I, 2021 Inkjet Print on Paper, 22" x 7"

SHAWNA LEE

Adapt to your Environment II, 2021 Inkjet Print on Paper, 22" x 7"

MORGAN LOUX II work within digital photography and use photoshop to enhance my work. The first time I picked up a camera I realized it is a way to tell a story without using words. My work includes a series of photographs that are put into a grid to tell a story. They are black and white photographs that show parts of human bodies interacting with dead or alive flowers.When you are only photographing a part of a body that interacts with other objects, it makes the viewer create their own scenarios in their head of what these photographs mean.

I want people to create their own stories while viewing my work. To figure out how the people in these photos relate to the flowers that are interacting with them. My goal is to spark discussions that deal with life, death, growing, femininity, masculinity or personal experiences of the viewers. I want people to be able to connect to these photographs, start deep conversations and share their own stories.

My goal is to make simple, story telling photographs that can make a connection with anyone who is viewing it.

Illumination, 2020 Inkjet Print on Paper, 12" x 16"

MORGAN LOUX

Pose 3, 2020 Inkjet Print on Paper, 10" x 8"

MORGAN LOUX

Pose 6, 2020 Inkjet Print on Paper, 10" x 8"

MORGAN LOUX

Family Roots, 2021 Inkjet Print on Paper, 11" x 14"

CHERYL MANNINO I am inspired by the natural world in which we live, and the psychological and emotional connections we humans have to it. The ability of the natural environment and things in it, from the tiniest insect to the largest mountain to spark the imagination and generate unexpected responses from within. . How our experience and associations with a certain location can trigger recollections of past events and the people who were part of them. I am an artist who works predominantly with acrylic paint to create mid to large scale works that combine both landscape and portraiture and straddle the line between representation and abstraction. My subjects are mainly friends and family members and fragments of personal moments with them that I integrate into the scenes. Bits and pieces of the lasting impressions they have made in my life. I paint familiar scenes because to me, landscape is not simply a topographical location, it has a spirit , a reverence, and a consciousness to it. I am fascinated by the way naturalism and abstraction merge in the outside world. Lines dissolve and flow into others and new shapes are discovered. This echoes the coming and going of reality and reflection. It harkens other states of perception and brings about a sense of yearning for distant memories or a sense of saudade. In my paintings I dabble and play with the concepts of existentialism and imagination creating an almost surreal atmosphere.

I aim to put an element of fun and surprise in my work. Placing glimpses of my private history on the primed canvas is my way of inviting the viewer to look closer, to ponder the meaning and reminisce about events they have experienced themselves. My goal is to express a sense of charm, tranquility and hope in my pieces.

Reverse Metamorphosis, 2021 Acrylic and Ink on Canvas, 36" x 36 x 1 1/2"

KERI MARINI

As an artist, I gain inspiration from everyday experiences with nature. My oil paintings serve as windows out to the landscape while including the impact that nature can have on our psyche. With a large focus on the color blue, I bring in my own emotional connection with the natural world, as well as capture a dramatized version of the logical landscape.

The works were originally greatly inspired by representation. As I went about my daily life, I would snap photographs of the scenery around me. These images would then become the base for my paintings. This system helped me to start the overall composition and value placement before I let the process of painting take over. As time went on, I was able to become more inventive within my paintings. After studying the photographs and using them as inspiration, I am now beginning to fully create my own scenes. I start with a general idea, a sketch, and then the feeling and movement of my brush across the surface takes control.

The paintings are less realistic and are associated more with feelings, emotions, and movements within that time of day and place. Personally, I create landscapes that I find to have a relaxing presence. Nature has an incredible essence to it that is almost indescribable. I tend to create emphasis on areas such as skies and bodies of water because these two entities have great power that can capture your gaze. I hope that viewers are able to generate their own emotions to my created realities and imagine what it might be like to exist within that realm.

7:15 AM, 2020 Oil on Wood, 20" x 16 x 1 1/2"

KERI MARINI

6:35 AM, 2021 Oil on Wood, 16" x 20 x 1 1/2"

KATE MCCARTY As a ceramic sculptor I spend my time creating content that interprets how I see everyday life. The focus throughout my work is to portray what I take in through forms others can understand. Creation starts solid and builds off that until it is finished enough to cut it up and put it all back together again. Through this work I am able to create a new reality that is able to exist in the one we are already living in. I make it approachable, not scary, so that it can intrigue any type of viewer. Inspiration comes from the shapes that the chaos of ordinary things create. I am very aware of my surroundings and attribute that to my creative process. What I observe gets converted into an entity that needs to be explored. With that process I am able to create surreal objects that feel real and a part of this dimension that we live in. I try with every finished sculpture to create an experience for the viewer that’s outside of their normal life and a peek into mine. For me, the work is a way to understand myself better and to help communicate the ways I feel and view things with other people. Working with clay and being able to physically make the shapes with my hands also inspires the forms and objects I ultimately create. Often I go into a piece with little idea of what the finished work will look like, but I find that more inspiring and often more successful than when I try to force the medium into my detailed vision.

Things You See in the Light, 2019 Stoneware, 16" x 24 x 8"

TIANNA MCGREGOR My work is rooted in the connection between nature and the human experience. I combine both the restorative elements of art making and the healing properties of the natural world to produce my artwork.

In my painting process, I use memory and the senses as a base for my work. I primarily work in homemade paint crafted from natural pigments. This process consists of traditional, prehistoric, and contemporary practices.

Included in this system is thick impasto for physical touch, an alluring palette for visual attraction, and a realm for viewers to experience my work on an individual basis. The contact made between my work and the viewer is meant to remind them of, and connect them to, parts of themselves and their consciousness.

Within the past few years I have been experimenting with many facets of multimedia materials. These mediums include acids, natural pigments, molding pastes, traditional binders, foraged matter and homemade inks. Currently, I am working on a series that pushes me to explore nature in a fashion that is a hybrid of both microscopic and aerial levels. It challenges me to bring awareness to the state of the earth’s environment by immersing the viewer in its beauty through abstracted landscapes. This helps me achieve a higher level of color perception and understanding.

Moving forward, I strive to cultivate my artwork and ideas while utilizing art as therapy at maximum capacity. This involves making positive artistic changes and decisions as I learn, grow, and face incoming challenges.

Earth II, 2021 Natural earth pigments, homemade ink, modeling paste, gloss gel medium, 72" x 60 x 2"

TIANNA MCGREGOR

Earth III, 2021 Natural earth pigments, modeling paste, gloss gel medium, 48" x 24" x 1 1/2"

ALISON MCLAUGHLIN Painting Works Statement: People spend a lot of time in bathrooms from day to day. These spaces are considered to be a private area in which daily routines occur. Many of our deepest thoughts are born in the bathroom, and yet, these spaces are often not regarded with significance.

Working with visible brushstrokes and transparent passages in oil paint, I create images of domestic bathrooms, occasionally introducing a figure into the space. The expressive use of paint brings energy into each piece, enticing the viewer to look deeper into the space.

I encourage the audience to spend time with each piece and consider their relationship with the space, asking the viewer to give a moment of contemplation to these mundane spaces and the routines that happen within. My paintings challenge the viewers’ perspective of the spaces they visit every day and invite them to explore the commonplace and find something exciting.

Bathroom Series, 2021 Oil on Canvas, 12" x 24" x 2 1/4"

ALISON MCLAUGHLIN

Green Bathroom, 2020 Oil on Canvas, 12" x 24" x 2 1/4"

ALISON MCLAUGHLIN Charcoal Works Statement: Through a reductive process with charcoal on paper, I create large scale drawings that depict intense yet mysterious imagery. Distorted ghostlike figures emerge to walk aimlessly around a vast empty space, appearing from hazy atmospheres and nondescript voids. Working with this imagery, I focus on capturing a range of emotions as I explore my own thoughts.

These unsettling and androgynous figures have become a release from my inner thoughts that I can’t yet explain myself. I pull from memories of past experiences as a way to process information, resulting in these drawings that have become a reflection on these experiences and emotions.

The ambient spaces between and around the figures exist as a place for the viewer to contemplate.

Despite them being deeply personal, these drawings are not solely about myself as an individual; they are also meant to be relatable for the community of young adults around me that are also getting started in their lives and going through similar experiences.

Together, 2020 Charcoal on Paper, 48" x 71" x 1/4"

CHRIS MOTT Emerging from an appreciation of what photography can preserve despite the ever present passing of time, my work utilizes both my own photographs and images collected from family archives as materials in collaborations with one another that honor a feeling of reminiscence, body, and memory.

Largely I work through photography while also incorporating other mediums such as painting and sculpting. My eyes see the world through photographs and compositions. When I begin a piece, it will often stem from a photograph or manifest as a photo in my mind when I start to plan the work. I implement other methods and materials because regardless what medium I start out with, my mind desires it to hold hands with another. Multiplicity and flexibility to cross mediums is important to create end results that express what I want the piece to say.

The subject of my work focuses on combining sentimentality and nostalgia, my end goal is always a sense of understanding and individual interpretation by the audience, whether it’s what I intended that meaning to be or not. To me, art is important when it can be viewed and have meaning to people even if they don’t relate to the exact moment or memory the piece is about. Implementing sentimentality into my works has the ability to not only change that piece for the viewer, but to influence them through their own empathy and shared experiences.

My goal is to create from specific experiences in my own life, but give a sensitivity with my art that can reach a broader audience. Themes like family, loss, the human form, and time are recurring in my work. I have the desire to express myself through these themes and mediums so I can create art to work through experiences and thoughts of my own.

House of Silence, 2021 Archival Inkjet Print, 13" x 19"

CHRIS MOTT

House of Silence, 2021 Archival Inkjet Print, 13" x 19"

CHRIS MOTT

8:36 AM, 2020 Accordion Photobook, 5.5" x 5.25"

CHRIS MOTT

Integument, 2021 Archival Inkjet Print, 20" x 30"

DORIE PENNY Most of my paintings are portraits of people in the LGBTQIA+ community, and there are two different routes that my work usually takes. I think that there’s something important about painting normal queer spaces, without making a huge political statement, without making it sexual. But to just normalize painting queer people in situations that they are in in their day to day lives.

I’ve recently become fascinated by old photos of my mother and his friends performing in small drag bars in the early 2000s. Right around this time I was in elementary school, and I never got to experience this first hand. I would watch my mom duct tape his breasts down and glue hair to his face on the weekends and I never batted an eye. I came to love seeing photos of these tiny hole in-the-wall dives that are filled with so much community. The ones where, people like my mother, had a child at home, who work nine to five jobs and their co-workers have no idea that they go by “ingénue” in the night (This was a queens drag name, but it means “an unsophisticated and innocent woman”).

Painting them is a way that I can show my appreciation towards those people, and to remind myself how lucky I’ve been to experience it. These photos are like my gay inheritance of my mothers misadventures in the early 2000s. My mom is long retired in the drag scene (although he still goes by Leo), so this is a way that I’m able to remember and pay homage to an amazing culture of people who never make it into the media. I paint for my mom, for his friends, for my own girlfriend, and for all of the other small town queers.

Moneybags, 2021 Oil on Canvas, 38" x 60" x 2"

DORIE PENNY

Aiyana (Two Lesbians and a Loft Space), 2021 Oil on Canvas, 36" x 48 x 2"

DORIE PENNY

Big Daddy and The Patinated Pennies, 2021 Oil on Canvas, 36" x 36" x 2"

SABRINA READINGER Using treasures that are discarded or out grown by their previous owners such as clothing, electronics, toys, discarded string, felt scraps, left behind art projects and other objects that I have hoarded over time, I am able to construct works that allow viewers to reminisce or go back to the spaces and objects of their childhood. By reoccupying these spaces, I am facilitating a conversation about growing up and the transformations that we go through. Using recognizable imagery, sharp and jagged edges, loud colors, dynamic shapes, and the combination of scraps and fine art to convey the emotional turmoil and distress of growing up mixed with an underlying playfulness from my childlike imagination.

The project can choose the materials or the materials can inspire the project. I’m always collecting scraps, junk, outgrown or unused, broken and other materials organically by going out and finding them in thrift stores, yard sales, storage, or the trash. I use these forgotten items in a symbolic method so as to reminisce on emotions and memories, to be transported to a contemplative state, all while using learned techniques or experimenting to create my imagination’s desire. When creating I strive to be uniquely myself with everything I do. Saving wasted items from a desolate future in the landfill, caring about nature and animals instead of technology, stories, emotions, self image, the environment, and the fantastical are all primary aspects of who I am. I want my viewers to be in awe and wonder by my passion and imagination.

Disconnect, 2021 Monitor, Three Wooden Sticks, 62" x 68" x 49"

SABRINA READINGER

Ambient (1 of 3), 2020 Photograph, Photo Paper, Ink, 8" x 10"

SABRINA READINGER

Ambient (2 of 3), 2020 Photograph, Photo Paper, Ink, 8" x 10"

SABRINA READINGER

Ambient (3 of 3), 2020 Photograph, Photo Paper, Ink, 8" x 10"

KYLISHA ROBERTS While combining portraiture and working with textiles, I am able to reflect on my experiences as a black woman and act upon my feelings on identity in the current age. By incorporating the technique of screen printing while also using a variety of textiles and acrylic paint, my work captures versions of self in an attempt to explore the different facets of our identities. Installed as traditional textile wall hangings, the works depict the images of modern women created using modern screen printing techniques to create a bold and impactful presence.

Working within the world of textiles, where there is a lack of POC it is critical that I represent myself. These mediums are used to highlight portraiture, while also being customizable to tailor it to a specific experience. I also specifically use the portraiture of African Americans within my work because it allows me to depict my own reflection.

Representation matters and I enjoy exploring controversial interactions to shed light on the immediacy of Black interactions with societal social constructs.

My mediation of this subject has given my viewer the opportunity to see variety in blackness and how there isn’t one set image. I am engaging in the conversation of what is Blackness and what it means. The artwork I create relates to my life and targets a group of people who were not recognized in the light they should have been. Frequently throughout history we struggled with how we are depicted in the art world and I think me showing what I see within myself, and others within my community, is the most effective way to instill what being Black and beautiful is. My content is showing a story of beauty within myself.

Hair Dice (Set), 2021 Shibori, Hand Dyed, Batik, 7" x 7" x 7"

KYLISHA ROBERTS

Hair Dice (Set), 2021 Shibori, Hand Dyed, Batik, 7" x 7" x 7"

KYLISHA ROBERTS

Shalissa, 2020 Acrylic Paint, Hand Dyed, Screen printing on Kona Cotton, 9" x 9"

DANIELLE SCHWESINGER Often employing flawed, fragile, or transmutable materials, my work questions how the passing of time affects the perception of value as seen through acts of preservation. Foremost in my mind are issues regarding sociopolitical climate and events, and ever-present concerns about the physically undeniable effects of aging and the cultural invisibility that it brings. Hidden threats, a constant barrage of information and misinformation, mixed up priorities, selfishness, disbelief, and suffocation steer my thoughts, and thus the works that I produce. Working primarily in sculpture, performance, and lens-based media, my work takes on a variety of forms as driven by the conceptual requirements at hand.

I think a lot about skins — suits of protection and biological epithelium — protective yet susceptible. At times, I abstract the form by removing it from context, manipulating and highlighting texture to further exaggerate the fissures and “flaws” that appear as time erodes my flesh. At once, these sources of brooding behavior are beautified and transformed into topographical maps. As such, they are further subjected to effects of time and forces of nature, but are also sites of action and existence.

Skins provide a barrier and an interface between self and other. They are simultaneously tool of alienation and connectedness. This is true of both touch and non-touch interactions: our skin dis- plays expressions which can be warm and welcoming or cold and warning.

Sometimes these expressions are mismatched from their intentions. These skins may also be natural or synthetic: a fleshy casing from which there is no escape or a fabricated covering that we willingly pull over our own natural skin to physically separate our flesh from its surroundings.

Self-imposed or not, alienation is something that, by definition, we experience alone. Even when it comes as a result of an external encounter, we most deeply experience it in our private inner worlds, necessarily cut off from others. Thus it must be, most wholly, a personal and lonely experience. I exaggerate the feeling of alienation through hyperfocus on the flaws of the skin, executing mundane tasks under the scrutiny of performance and video, and reimagining materials in new contexts.

Aseptic Chamber, 2020 Video recording of live performance in handcrafted plastic inflatable suit, Video 3:50

DANIELLE SCHWESINGER

Aseptic Chamber, 2020 Accessory sculpture to previous. Life-size freestanding sculpture that is kept upright with a small electric blower

DANIELLE SCHWESINGER

Specimens, 2020 Plaster life castings, gold paint, steel, cement, Dimensions dependent on installation, height range from (23.25” to 33.5”)

DANIELLE SCHWESINGER

Hidden from View, 2020 Video projection on plaster bandage castings. Intended to be viewed as sculptural installation consisting of 3 life-size plaster molds of the bottom portion of the face attached to wall at viewing height, on which video is projected, Video 3:06

ELISE SERRECCHIA Coming from a place of soul searching, I walk through familiar spaces within nature looking for unique moments of curiosity to study and capture. I attempt to show the uniqueness of every encounter with nature. Working with black and white silver gelatin prints and digital photography I take my camera into spaces in hopes to show more of what I feel and see when I am one with nature.

Nature is my calm spot, it is the place I go to when I need open space for endless thoughts and ideas to flow from my head. I can step out of the “real world” and society for a few moments to really get my perspective on where I am in this universe. I began to hike when I thought I really lost my place in the world and that is where I ended up finding my hobby and my concept in the art world. My admiration for nature allows me to dig deeper into my work and show details that most may walk by without noticing, the small nooks, bark textures, movement, and form that is created naturally.

When viewing my work, I am hoping one can simply see something about nature they haven’t entirely thought about before. I can not make others see and feel what I do for nature but maybe some of that love will come through my photos.

Leaves I, 2020 Colored Inkjet Paper Print, 20”x 20”

ELISE SERRECCHIA

Bent Bark, 2020 Colored Inkjet Paper Print, 24”x 20”

ELISE SERRECCHIA

Leaves II, 2020 Colored Inkjet Paper Print, 24”x 20”

AMBER SITES Using photography as a means to capture the overlooked details of nature allows me to elevate the beauty I see around me so that my viewers can find a similar appreciation within their own surroundings. The way a patch of light hits a lake stops me and I allow my camera to become my window to frame the scene in an authentic way to allow the balance and intricacies of the space to capture the “subject”. Discovering contrasting color, texture and manipulating my depth of field allows me to transform unappreciated moments into something worthy of preserving.

Within my work I utilize a variation of subjects, outputs and viewing methods to captivate viewers with my perspectives of the world.

The love I share for landscapes and photography came to me at a young age from my grandfather. When I would visit, he would show me photographs he had taken on his walks in the park every morning before work. This has always fascinated me and inspired me to follow in his footsteps. I don’t want to show people a photoshopped world.

My job is to show the authenticity in many landscaped views, even the unsightly scenery. I use the lack of photoshop as a way to aid conversations about the state the environment is in today. My work spans from a range of film photography to digital photography depending on the desired outcome for the project.

Steel Stacks Inkjet Paper Print, 32”x 40”

AMBER SITES

Driving in a Winter Wonderland Inkjet Paper Print, 16”x 24”

ALEX STRUNK Strunk utilizes complex forms to create expressive figures in an attempt to have the viewer reflect on the subconscious nature of particular emotions. These works are often related to suppressed, unacknowledged, or unwanted emotions. Often; one is able to confront these emotions, or simply have a moment to acknowledge them as a part of one’s being, through these works. Strunk is influenced heavily by personal traumas, life events, and experiences. These pieces work as an outlet for the artist, often drawing on universal expressions to convey these emotions.

Unethical Consumption, 2020 Screenprint on Paper , 15”x 12”

ALEX STRUNK

Earthbound, 2019 Zinc Etching, Ink on Paper, 9.5”x 12.5”

STACEY WOLFINGER I make drawings, paintings, chalk pastels, weaving, textiles, and sculptures. I primarily focus on sculpture and textiles because they enable me to be more hands-on with my work and they allow the viewer to experience my pieces in space. Recently, my artwork has become more personal to show the struggles and pain that my family and I have experienced. Creating art is an outlet to allow myself to express my inner feelings.

Family and friends have a big impact on my life. I create emotional abstract portraits of them to show who they are, their stories, and what they mean to me. The choice of material in my pieces corresponds to the subject. The material I use for females has a feminine quality such as, fabric, flower, and bright colors. Whereas the materials I use for males have a masculine quality, things like metal, wood, and less vibrant colors.

Dad's Back, 2020 Steel, bolts

STACEY WOLFINGER

My Back, 2020 Wood and Fabric filled with Polyfil, 36”x 4" x 4”

Special thanks to: Dr. Dan Haxall Chair of the Art Department

Professor Jayne Struble Advisor, Business of Art

Karen Stanford Director of University Galleries

Dorie Penny Gallery Intern

Cover Image: Alison McLoughlin (detail) Together, 2020 Charcoal on Paper, 48" x 71" x 1/4"