The experience of travel, the chaos and abundance of earth’s climate, novel approaches to film—these are among the themes in the Ildiko Butler Gallery’s current Faculty Spotlight Exhibition.
The works of three visual arts faculty members—Abby Goldstein, Ross McLaren, and Carleen Sheehan—are on display through March 9 in the first-floor gallery in the Lowenstein building. An opening reception will be held Thursday, Jan. 28, from 6 to 8 p.m.
Goldstein’s works—mixed media on paper and oil paint on wood panel—reflect her interest in “how our physical experience of travel, space, climate, and place can be transcribed into a codified visual language within a two dimensional plane,” she said in a statement.
“I like to read local lore and study maps of a region to use as reference material for my paintings and drawings,” she said. “Local lore allows a glimpse into the felt history of the place.”
Sheehan’s work, mixed media on canvas, is drawn from her Nightvision series, part of a body of work that explores “the experience of contemporary space” as well as the form and effect of weather, according to her website.
McLaren created side-by-side displays of video taken in his fish tank, via a GoPro camera, that signify “a school of fish … converted through machine/motion into light energy,” he said in a statement.
Another theme is “school gallery as aquarium,” he said, but added that he meant to leave latitude for viewers to interpret the work.
“The kind of artwork I like (is) not nailed down by the artist’s definition,” he said. “I think any artwork is completed when there’s feedback from the onlooker.”
