Students debut their artwork; some for the final time before graduation
Ryan Loredo
Equinox Staff
The Thorne-Sagendorph Art Gallery hosted a house of attention-grabbing works of art along with the artists themselves at a reception on Friday, April 15.
The Thorne art gallery of KSC hosted a variety of artwork ranging from free hanging sculptures to student made art books.
The Emerging Art show is an event showcasing works of art from Bachelor of Fine Arts candidates, selected art majors, and graduating KSC seniors.
The event was put on by the KSC Art Department in order to display the works of many graduating seniors, some for the last time before they graduate.
Assistant Professor of Art, Lynn Richardson, helped organize the event. The room is divided into three parts, professor Richardson said. “On the left gallery we have all the graduating BFA students, and in the front of this gallery (the right side) we have all the BA students, and in this gallery it is all the underclassmen.”
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The main artists, as said by Richardson, are, “The eight over in that show (the left BFA gallery), so Erin McHugh, Cat Jennison, Charity Thackston, Jenn Tremblay, Briana (Mangiaracina), Jane (Flanagan), and Chelsea Blackmer.”
The event was organized in February, according to Richardson. She said, “I work with my senior seminar class and we started organizing.”
Richardson said, “The students come over here and do installation and work out, kind of curate themselves into a space, which it usually takes about two minutes.” The art ranges from inspirations originating from personal interests by each of the students.
One student, senior Brittany Kelly, said, “I like to bring up things, like on a political subject matter, and I like bright colors, pastels.” Charity Thackston, also a senior, said, “For me, because most of the pieces come from a mold.”
“It’s about how people are socially constructed or molded to believe certain things are true. Like ideas about race, gender, sexuality, they only exist because we say they do,” she said. BFA senior Catherine Jennison had several pieces on display including a hand-made cabinet featuring several specimens of nature (soil, grass, water, etc.) including small living organisms.
Jennison said, “When we were collecting stuff we noticed there were a lot of bugs and stuff in the water, so it adds a little touch.”
She added she plans to release the bugs back into the water after the show. “They are going back,” she said.
Not all the art was for a specific purpose. Senior Jill Fortin said her art is, “Definitely my way of expressing myself, this is my way of having fun, hopefully letting people in on my fun and what I like to do.”
Her favorite piece is her “net-working” piece. “It’s definitely the most fun I’ve had creating a piece.”
One student, Senior Erin McHugh, said her inspiration stems from her travel experience. “It’s my experiences from going abroad and just meaning to explore the rest of the world and the connections I made with people.”
Additionally, McHugh said, “I want to explore a minimalist thing; lines of shadow, stuff like that. I want to explore gravity with the plastics and the rope, they’re all free hanging.”
The piece McHugh is referring to was possibly the largest sculpture featured at the gallery.”
Astronomy and Greco-Roman Mythology is the inspiration for one artist’s work.
Senior Jennifer Tremblay featured artwork with the relationship between our solar system and our relationship to mythology.
“It’s about the human relationship to the universe,” said Tremblay.
“I don’t want to be cheesy and say outer space, but to that idea of planets and stars and I just wanted to explore more of that relationship and how it has changed throughout several thousand years,” she said.
She also said it was also about, “how the ideas of past culture kind of get layered into the ideas of the next culture.”
She added, “A lot of my artwork deals with that, like how the deity names are still named after the planets which some people know some people don’t. I mean, the planets themselves have their original Roman names we still use them today. Just how there is a build-up of history and we rely on that, more than we think we do and how that history reflects the more we think about space in a subtle way we don’t realize.”
Her favorite piece, she said, is the piece titled “Jupiter” because “it’s just the most aesthetically pleasing.”
A more modern approach to art was given by senior Joshua Randall who incorporates the relationship between city structures and nature into his works of art.
He said, “It’s just a collaboration of pretty much what I have seen here in the Keene area and just my own twist on issues and things to combine them with really.”
Attendees of the gallery can vote for their favorite piece of art.
The winner of the gallery will win a cash prize of $100.
The art reception was provided by the Thorne Art Gallery and proved interesting to the attendees.
The gallery will operate from April 16 until May 7.
The hours the gallery will be open are Sunday to Wednesday, 12 p.m. to 5 p.m., Thursday and Friday from 12 p.m. to 7 p.m., and Saturday from 12 p.m. to 8 p.m.
Ryan Loredo can be contacted at rloredo@keeneequinox.com
