A Call to Halt is an installation and critical timeline of the Euromissiles Crisis, and the nuclear abolition movement in the United States from 1977-1987. The installation includes a reenactment of the 1982 Nuclear Freeze Referenda, in which Wisconsin was the first in the nation to put international nuclear disarmament policy to a popular vote.
Th exhibit includes a timeline of important events during the crisis as a series of archival images and captions superimposed with stenciled spray paint. Cultural, political and activist events are referenced, telling a story of collective public outcry and the power of ordinary people.
Visitors can use provided ballots and reenact Wisconsin’s nuclear disarmament referendum. The reenactment is both a reminder of the power of democracy and an opportunity for viewers to become active participants.
A Call to Halt will be on display from September 26 to October 27 in the Permanent Collection Gallery.
Through a broad, tactile mixture of textiles, printmaking, painting, and sculpture, An Advocate for an Imposter explores the nuanced relationship between imitation and authenticity. Beiswenger’s embroidery, sculpture, and weavings comprise an expansive, kind, and thoughtful conversation.
The central feature of An Advocate for an Imposter is a formal armchair upholstered in AstroTurf, flanked by two log end tables and resting on a large rug. On one side is a bowl of acorns. The arrangement creates interesting conversation about the distinction between “imposter” and “genuine.”
The AstroTurf upholstery is a particularly entertaining juxtaposition. AstroTurf is definitely an imposter, oversaturated plastic pretending to be a perfect, living yard. As upholstery, it’s doubly false–fake grass pretending to be an appropriate fabric for a seat (but actually a prickly, unpleasant surprise). The natural end tables, however, complicate the situation. Raw, unfinished wood–bare nature–is inserted into this indoor, almost domestic scene, yet the AstroTurf upholstery attempts to imitate the vibrance of living plants outdoors. Which belongs where? Who is really the imposter?
The rug below the chair has been printed with scrabble-worthy words that would pose a challenge for even the most experienced elementary school spelling bee champion. The nest of words is beautiful but overwhelming. It can be easy to feel like an imposter, standing in a space covered in terms you are ashamed you don’t know.
The wall facing the gallery entrance is dedicated to a life-sized skeleton, layers of patterned fabric exactingly embroidered with tight, floral embellishments. Next to it is pinned a small, three-inch square portrait. The contrasts between the two–in size, media, style, and presentation–are stark. The portrait, in its intimately small scale and open, unguarded expression, offers a deeply genuine moment of connection, while the skeleton is a much more precisely arranged look inside a person (literally). Both are undeniably appealing, but deeply different.
A series of cloth panels juxtapose carefully embroidered forms with sketches, splotches, and smudges. The organic, unintentional flaws and the precisely realized diagrams both have an appealing integrity to them. Sketches, coffee stains, and wrinkles–the fingerprints of an imperfect reality–honor the time, effort, and person beside the ideals of their work.
An Advocate for an Imposter will be on display in the Godschalx Gallery through October 20.
As fall semester begins, take a moment to reflect on Summer’s End, an exhibition of achingly beautiful work by Rafael Francisco Salas. The exhibition primarily features oil paintings of indistinct rural landscapes and a county fair in “a metaphorical change of season. It is an oblique atmospheric meditation on political and social divides. The landscape emerges as an emotional rather than a literal one. The county fair at summer’s end is a place of reckoning, full of innocence, and innocence lost.”
From left to right: County Fair #3 (Calf), County Fair #1 (Princess), County Fair #2 (Shovel), 2021. Oil on canvas.
Salas’ paintings feature luminous backgrounds, their inner glow contrasting with a persistent shadow that creeps in at the corners of the canvases. He doesn’t shy away from saturated, earthy colors, but, paired with muted grays, the overall effect is a sense of disillusioned nostalgia.
2021 Landscape, 2021. Oil on canvas.
Summer’s End layers the hopefulness of the ideal, the clarity of recollection, and the crumbling of memory. Sharply rendered figures and sparkling fireworks are placed atop hazy rural landscapes, bleeding into but distant from their surroundings. Focal points dissociate into abstract strokes of jeweled color, and backgrounds fade into the feeling of a landscape, rather than a physical location.
In addition to large oil paintings, Summer’s End includes a collection of process sketches. This body of delicate, thoughtful works contextualize the ideas that culminated in each painting. It’s interesting to see how a change in medium affects the perception of each subject, with small studies in ink, acrylic, and collaged paper a quietly different treatment than the large oil paintings.
Process work.
Salas is a professor of art at Ripon College, where he also serves as chair of the department of Art and Art History, and has also been appointed to the Wisconsin Arts Board. His work has been displayed in New York City, San Diego, and Boston. He’s also shown work extensively in the Midwest, including in the Neville Public Museum, the Museum of Wisconsin Art, the John Michael Kohler Arts Center, and the Frank Juarez Gallery. His work is represented by Portrait Society Gallery in Milwaukee. Salas has also worked as an arts writer for the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, Newcity Art Chicago, The Isthmus Magazine and Urban Milwaukee.
Rockets #1 and Rockets #2, 2022. Oil on canvas.
Summer’s End opened on August 29 and can be viewed in the Baer Gallery through September 22. A reception will be held from 5 to 7 p.m. on Thursday, September 8. The gallery is open to the campus and the community.
Blake William’s Commonplace is anything but ordinary. The show, which was housed in the Baer Gallery at the start of the spring semester, includes ceramic and wire sculptures, as well as furniture sourced from Williams’ family, like her great-mother’s dining room table. These sculptures explore the human condition, how an individual relates to their surroundings, and how identity is formed and reformed.
Gammy’s Runner, Great-Mother’s Table, 2009-2010. Porcelain, wire, and table. In the back, Secret Recipes, 2019. Porcelain, wire, digital decals, and chair.
Through imagery of bones and flowers, Williams studies the ghosts of the past in the everyday, the transience of life, and the search for identity. Her work places a special significance on the contributions of domestic work and honors the memories bound up in objects of ancestors.
Gammy’s Runner, Great-Mother’s Table, as well as Resilience II, with Waiting for Summer in March on the far left.
Blake Williams is an artist and Associate Professor at Michigan State University. Her work has been exhibited internationally, and she has pieces in national private collections, as well as the Jingdezhen Ceramics Museum. Williams has also been featured in American Craft and Ceramics Monthly magazines.
Nourish 2010. Porcelain, wire, and chair.
This peaceful, contemplative exhibition was on display between January 24 and February 17 in the Baer Gallery. It was a quiet space to consider home and self, and to honor the sacredness of memory.
The Senior Art Exhibition is the capstone experience for all art majors. Each art major creates a body of work centered around a theme of their choice and exhibit their work in the Bush Art Center galleries. This year’s exhibition, featuring work from eight seniors, explores a wide range of topics, including the greatest moments in sports history, a fantasy world that feels like home, and the power of water.
Kori HalsteadTrevor CornellRita HammCora McMainsLeft to right from top: work by Kori Halstead, Trevor Cornell, Rita Hamm, and Cora McMains
Our graduating art majors this year are Francesca Facchini, Cora McMains, Marybeth Koss, Kori Halstead, Ally Laidlaw, Trevor Cornell, Megan Huth, and Rita Hamm. The 2022 Senior Art Exhibition is on display in the Baer and Godschalx Galleries until May 6.
Works of Water. Marybeth KossBare Witness (detail). Ally LaidlawJOIN Brewing Co. Megan HuthUtopia (detail). Rita HammOphidiophobia—Fear of Snakes. Francesca FacchiniBare Witness (detail) Ally Laidlaw
The current exhibition in the Baer Gallery, From Me to You, explores topics of self-perception, beauty and the Black female identity through photography and sculpture. Murphy-Price reflects on the problematic weight of expectations as an inherited female legacy, “passed down from me to you.”
Althea Murphy-Price is an artist and professor at the University of Tennessee at Knoxville whose work explores the social implication of beauty and its relationship to female identity, women, and culture. Her pieces, which range from screenprint collages to rugs made from human hair, have been shown internationally, including in Spain, China, Japan, Italy and Sweden. She has also been featured in Art Papers Magazine, CAA Reviews, Contemporary Impressions Journal, Art in Print, Printmaking: A Complete Guide to Materials and Process, and Printmakers Today. She studied at Spelman College and received a Master of Arts in Printmaking and Painting at Purdue University, as well as a Master of Fine Arts from Tyler School of Art, Temple University.
Much of Murphy-Price’s work grapples with the social perceptions and the sense of personal identity tied to Black women’s hair and hairstyles. Her Goody Girl series of photographs responds to the high expectations of #blackgirlmagic, a hashtag intended to uplift and empower, but can also feel like a pressure to perform. Through a metaphor of barrettes and bows, Murphy-Price explores how trying to live up to fantastical expectations can have real consequences.
Her more recent prints, including Black Bird Girl and Requiem, feature 3D printed objects arranged sculpturally in young children’s hair. The dizzying array of hair accessories used in these photographs also composes her sculpture Counter. Some of these accessories, like bows and flowers, are innocent and childlike, but others, like satellites, bullets, and birdcages, have connotations associated with heavier subjects. All have implied expectations, and carrying their weight can be difficult.
Counter (detail) 2021. 3D printed polymer.
From Me to You opened in two stages, on Feb. 28 and March 3, and can be visited through March 31.
Fine art for $5 – or less. That was the promise of an art-vending-machine initiative that added an interactive component to the 2019 “Why We Collect” exhibit at the Baer Gallery at St. Norbert College.
The 2019 Senior Art Exhibition boasts the work from seventeen graduating studio art and graphic design major seniors, featuring mediums such as printmaking, packaging design, short film, oil painting, and sculpture, just to name a few. Up now until May 3, 2019 in the Bush Art Center Galleries you can come see the ultimate works of:
Julia Allen
Emerson Bartch
Sarah Chojnacki
Carla Davila
Joseph Donohue
Madeline Gassner
Jennifer Han
El Hein
Katie Hopkins
Sam Kalies
Lindsay Kropp
Emma May
Kayla Mitchell
Cate O’Brien
Morgan Pennings
Nicolette Sylvain
Elizabeth Schaal
Artist statements explaining the artists’ work and visions are provided by each artist and are available for viewing in a binder found inside the doors of the Baer Gallery. Come celebrate the hard work of the graduating art class of 2019 while you can!
Sandra Martinez is a symbolist painter based in Door County, WI. Martinez renders contemporary works on paper, vellum and other materials that reference human, plant, and shelter forms. As part of Martinez Studio, she was recently awarded a prestigious USA Artists Fellowship. Her work has been exhibited at many institutions, including the Smithsonian Craft Show and the Museum of Wisconsin Art.
Martinez’s exhibition, Between the Lines, displayed in the Baer Gallery, is a mixture of paper sculptures and wall hangings, paintings, and woven rugs. Her bold sense of shape and design transports the viewer into entirely new physical and mental spaces: a feat well worth the time to come and experience. Come see her work before it moves on!
Martinez will also be giving an Artist’s Talk in the Bush Art Center on Friday, March 1 from 12-1p.m. Refreshments will not be served, so feel free to bring your lunch while listening and learning something new.
Details on this exhibition’s reception can be found at the bottom of this post.
Recently returned from a fall semester sabbatical, Brian Pirman, Associate Professor of Art at the BAC, has taken over the Godschalx gallery with an explosion of color and pattern. From wall to wall and floor to ceiling, Pirman’s Experiemental Digital Patterns is a visually kinetic space that refuses to be ignored. Don’t miss your chance to experience this show and be struck with wonder.
A reception for both shows will take place on Thursday, February 28 from 5-7p.m. in the Bush Art Center lobby. Both Martinez and Pirman will be in attendance, and light refreshments will be served.
