Gallery exhibition features works by Fredonia faculty members

Diverse works ranging from small porcelain objects to a 9- by-11-foot painting, plus wearables, animated films and more created by 14 current, tenured and contingent, faculty members  in the Department of Visual Arts and New Media will be featured in the next exhibition at the Cathy and Jesse Marion Art Gallery.

The Department of Visual Arts and New Media Faculty Exhibition is on display from Jan. 24 through Feb. 19. A reception on Friday, Jan. 27 from 6 to 9 p.m. will offer a chance to meet the artists. The exhibition and reception are free and open to the public.

The Marion Art Gallery is located on the main level of Rockefeller Arts Center.

Participating artists are: Nicholas Borelli (Adjunct Lecturer, Drawing and Painting), Jason Dilworth (Associate Professor, Graphic Design),  Kathleen Fenton (Lecturer, Animation and Illustration), Tim Frerichs (Professor, Foundations), Phil Hastings (Associate Professor, Film and Video) and Stephen Komp  (Associate Professor, Photography).

Also taking part are Liz Lee (Professor, Photography), Allora McCullough (Lecturer, Ceramics),  Kevin Opp (Adjunct Lecturer, Graphic Design), Abbey Paccia (Lecturer, Animation and Illustration), Casey Kelly Pérez (Adjunct Lecturer, Graphic Design), Peter Tucker (Associate Professor, Sculpture), Margaret Urban (Associate Professor, Graphic Design) and Sara Zak (Adjunct Lecturer, Drawing and Painting).

Lecturer Borelli’s mixed media figures — “Mutant,” “Death Scroll,” “Hunting Party,” “Interpreter” — belong to a dystopian future in which large headless reptilian creatures are the hunters, and humans have mutated into monsters.

“Many Returns,” a watercolor by Lecturer Fenton, is a whimsical depiction of the human brain, heart, and nervous system; the antique oval frame adds to its incongruity.

Associate Professor Dilworth has been designing the Marion art gallery’s exhibition catalogs since Spring 2016. The exhibition gives visitors the opportunity to view the diversity of his innovative designs, from a 16-page self-cover to an 80-page bilingual perfect bound.

Professor Frerichs’ current work addresses human activity as the dominant influence on the environmental problems plaguing Lake Erie and the Great Lakes system. Frerichs emphasizes sustainable processes and materials in creating his work. Most materials are locally sourced, including items found from the shore or near shore of Lake Erie. The exhibition includes an artist book sculpture which incorporates rusted Lake Erie shale, archival ink jet photographs on handmade remnant kozo and abaca paper with blowouts using Lake Erie Ice melt, and monoprints on handmade Mitsumata paper collaged on vintage Lake Erie maps.

Associate Professor Hastings’ short animated film “With Love and Sincerity” is an exploration of bad relationships.

Associate Professor Komp works exclusively with analog materials, primarily black and white film and gelatin silver prints. Included in the exhibition are three toned gelatin silver prints titled “Gala,” “Bones” and “Last.”

Professor Lee created her digital photographs series “Misinformation” over the span of seven years. The frames spin to reveal a total of eight images in this interactive piece. She describes her current research interests as a study in “visual truth” and if subjective reality, what is seen and what is believed, even exists.

Lecturer McCullough writes of her artwork, “I use ceramic materials and mixed media to create narratives about overcoming challenges and difficulties in life. Ultimately, I am searching for a physical representation of the human soul.” Titled “Moirai,” the intimate porcelain sculpture series presents a spider, a key, willow branches, and a pair of scissors all entangled and connected by a gold thread.

In an effort to inform graphic design students about career possibilities, Lecturer Opp created three posters for the exhibition that represent the type of commercial work he does outside of SUNY Fredonia. They illustrate spreads for the National Association of State Foresters Annual Report, The Russia Ukraine War Factbook by Craig Reed, Jr., and the Encorus Group Branding Program.

Shot in the span of a day, Lecturer Paccia’s film “Penumbral Drift “combines video footage of illusive shadow forms with rotoscoped animation to create a meditative reflection on time and space. Each scene exists within the slow rhythms of the earth and the cavernous landscapes of our tiny neighbors. These spaces and the beings who inhabit them are both familiar and mysterious, revealing wonder in everyday encounters and rewarding quiet attention.

In 2022, Lecturer Kelly Pérez launched a children’s brand called Forest Crossing Friends with the goal to teach kids about life lessons through the adventures of forest critters who live and work in Whispering Woods. The brand currently has merchandise and a children’s book series for sale in book stores and online. She self-published, illustrated, designed, and authored the first book in the series called “Tippy’s Threads.” The exhibition includes the first book in the series, website, and merchandise. Pérez is an independent brand designer by way of her business, Limbic Studio. She works with several outdoor brands, in addition to breweries and distilleries throughout the U.S. Select packaging work for New Realm Brewing and Distilling are on display.

Associate Professor Tucker’s harmonograph and wearables demonstrate his love for the beauty of wood and his penchant for experimentation. Originally invented in 1844 by Scottish mathematician Hugh Blackburn, a harmonograph is a mechanical device that uses swinging pendulums to draw pictures. Tucker’s three pendulum harmonograph is based on measurements and techniques developed by Karl Sims. It is made from black walnut (local fallen tree), cherry, hard maple, balsa, bamboo, canary wood, steel, iron, pen, rubber band, and paper. His wearable forms combine the natural beauty of wood with jewelry making techniques. 

Associate Professor Urban’s mixed media piece “Frame Breakers 2049: Future Artifacts” is a work of speculative futuring. Scarce resources have forced people to use low-tech, found objects for most applications while saving high-tech, purpose made materials for healthcare, space exploration, energy production, and other places that are essential to health, wellbeing, and progress.

Lecturer Zak’s 9-by-11-foot oil painting “Limits of the diaphane” consists of six stretched canvases. Zak writes of her work, “This painting, like the vast majority of my work, explore the shifting nature of time, place, concept, actuality, and paint.  All of these notions rely heavily on the stability of our own perception of them—what if the perception keeps fracturing? What if time doesn’t just move forward but rather it moves like the swing, or the carousel, or the waves?” 

The Department of Visual Arts and New Media is accredited by the National Association of Schools of Art and Design. Areas of study include: foundations, art history, animation and illustration, ceramics, drawing and painting, graphic design, film and video, photography, and sculpture. More than 240 art majors are currently enrolled.

Funding for the exhibition and reception is provided by the Cathy and Jesse Marion Endowment Fund of the Fredonia College Foundation and Friends of Rockefeller Arts Center.

Gallery hours are: Tuesday through Thursday from noon to 4 p.m., Friday and Saturday from noon to 6 p.m., and Sunday from noon to 4 p.m.

For more information about the exhibition or Marion Art Gallery or to schedule a group tour, contact Director Barbara Räcker via email or call 716-673-4897.