COALESCENCE
Senior Thesis Exhibits | Class of 2023
On Display: May 2-6, 2023
Opening Reception: May 6, 4 p.m., Barrington Center for the Arts
Each spring Gordon College Visual Arts presents senior exhibits in the Gallery at Barrington Center for the Arts. Senior art majors develop a body of work and a personal artistic direction culminating in a gallery exhibit their final semester. Each senior chooses the media and conceptual thematic center of this work while meeting weekly with a faculty mentor and fellow senior artists.
Ordinary Saints
On Display: August 2022–October 2022
Reception: Homecoming Weekend
Paintings by Bruce Herman for a collaboration with poet Malcolm Guite and composer J. A. C. Redford.
Part of Gordon College's 2022 Homecoming.
About the Exhibition: After many years of working with the human figure in an implicit narrative context, I decided to try to paint particular persons (instead of “types” or generalized figures that are subservient to the narrative). The traditional posed portrait was not what I was after; rather, I wanted to make an image that seemed to mediate the “real presence” of the person (as opposed to an idealized or flattering portrayal). When I completed the painting of my father, I suddenly remembered my childhood desire as a young artist: to make a painting of a person that “felt” like them even more than simply reproducing a likeness. I’ve included a couple of formal portrait commissions I’ve done for comparison. The requirements of formal institutional portraiture were a challenge, but I believe that I managed, in spite of these constraints, to communicate something of the person there as well.
About Bruce Herman: Bruce Herman’s art has been exhibited in Boston, New York, Los Angeles and most major cities in the US and abroad in Italy, England, Israel, Japan and Hong Kong. Herman’s art is in many public and private art collections, including the Vatican Museums in Rome, Cincinnati Museum of Fine Arts and Hammer Museum Grunewald Print Collection in L.A.
Herman’s art and writings are published in a 30-year retrospective in Through Your Eyes 2013, Eerdmans Books, Grand Rapids. His published essays are found in many print and online journals, including IMAGE, Comment, Books and Culture and many others.
Herman has taught for three decades and curated over 100 exhibitions for Gordon College. He holds the endowed Lothlórien Distinguished Chair in Fine Arts at the school and is gallery director and art collection manager.
Reflecting the Glory
On Display: October 2022–December 2022
Reception: October 29, 4 p.m.
Featuring new works in gold leaf by Sandra Bowden.
About the Exhibition: I have come to see that my work as an artist is described best as seeking connections to our past. For over 50 years I have worked in a sequence of multiple series of paintings and prints related to archaeology findings, geological forms, early languages, musical scores, ancient illuminations and the history of art. Each of these areas of exploration has enhanced my appreciation for the great treasures from our shared past.
"Reflections of Glory" is my most recent work continuing this conversation of connections as a way to pay homage to the “Icons of Western Art.” This show highlights several gilded encaustic panels that recall many iconic paintings from art history. Their distinct shapes identify the historic work, but, because of their solid gold surface, allow the viewer to delight in the radiance of each panel while drawing on memory and imagination to fill in the forms.
Two multi-panel installations are featured in "Reflections of Glory." Forty encaustic gilded panels and forty black panels that are incised with text become 40 Days/40 Nights. Another multipanel work has 100 5”x 5” gilded squares and is entitled One Hundred Percent.
To complement the wall-mounted paintings, several artists' books provide a rich, three-dimensional dialog between the works. I have fixed open actual books, allowing the open face of the book to be the painted surface—many incised with text.
Artists do not merely put on canvas what can be seen. They try to uncover something beyond the range of the eyes. I believe that art is a means to illuminate both the interior life and the exterior world, both seen and unseen. I hope "Reflections of Glory" will lead those who see the exhibition beyond the edge of their consciousness into a place of splendor, wonder and transcendence.
About Sandra Bowden: Visual artist Sandra Bowden has been interpreting Scripture and her own spiritual walk through mixed media for more than 40 years. She has been acclaimed as one of the most unique, impressive and inspiring Christian artists in America. Bowden’s work has been featured in books, magazines and gallery shows across the United States, Canada, Italy and Jerusalem.
Her work fuses the vivid yet traditional imagery of the Old Testament—stone tablets and artifacts, Hebrew inscriptions, architectural depictions—with images of Christ’s passion, important music scores and God’s natural creations. She has issued several series of artworks over the years: crucifixion scenes, artistic use of text and color, new interpretations of classic religious artwork, even altered books with applied textures and hues. God’s grandeur and creativity shine through in each piece of her art.
“My Christian faith has been the driving force behind my art,” Bowden says. “I look at the making of a piece of art as a kind of doxology, a prayer or conversation with God. I don’t mean this in any mystical way, but my ideas come out of my theology and thoughts about God. I am something of a theologian, but one who translates those interpretations into visual form.”
Sandra Bowden's Website
Winter Exhibition 2023
On Display: January 20, 2023–March 3, 2023
Reception: January 20, 4 p.m., Barrington Center for the Arts
Featuring new mixed media and 3-D works by David Kasparek.
About the Exhibition: We understand our physical world through our senses. Our bodies collect experiences to shape how we understand the world around us. Media, technology and innovation extend our senses, propelling us forward in knowledge and understanding beyond the limits of what our senses can discern on their own. The metaphor of extension mythologizes and promotes what we mostly celebrate as “progress”—a neverending journey of expansion in human achievement.
But what if the metaphor was inverted to see our senses, and our human attempts to extend our senses, as ultimately limited? This new way of conceptualizing frames our five human senses as a set of walls—a container obscuring realities beyond what even our enhanced physical senses can grasp on their own. My work for this exhibit is an exploration of this opposing metaphor of limitation.
I titled each of the five walled forms/images in this body of work “Macroscopes.” Unlike a microscope that extends inward into the physical world, a Macroscope expands outward to investigate a larger reality not confined within the cell of our senses.
Each Macroscope is meant to be an invitation to the viewer to see themselves in a cell that is physically limited but imaginatively expansive. By understanding our senses as limited, we ironically can imagine a transcendent reality that could exist outside our limitations. This reality can penetrate and radiate within the midst or our human container if we are willing and open to discern it and, most importantly, rely on one of our most intrinsically human senses—imagine it.
About David Kasparek: David is a designer, artist and an associate professor of graphic design at Messiah College in Grantham, PA. He received his Master of Graphic Design (MGD) from the College of Design at North Carolina State University in Raleigh, N.C.
David’s ongoing personal and client-based work, as well as his teaching, focuses on creating meaningful visual form that communicates, shapes or creates content in compelling ways (through various media and processes).
His work has appeared in national and international publications such as Print Magazine, Design: Type: A Seductive Collection of Alluring Type Designs (Rockport), Design for Special Events: 500 of the Best Logos, Invitations, and Graphics (Rockport), The Big Book of Graphic Design (Collins Design), Graphic Design and Religion (GIA), Print Magazine, Typography 3: Global Vision (Duncan Baird Publishers) and Two-Color Graphics (Rockport).
He has exhibited his work at various venues, including Seton Hill University in Greensburg, PA; Franklin & Marshall College in Lancaster, PA; and Biola University in La Mirada, CA (a joint exhibition with painter Daniel Finch).
David Kasparek's Website
Instagram: @d_kasparek
Student Exhibitions
Findings 2023
On Display: January 28, 2023–February 18, 2023
Opening Reception: January 28, 4 p.m., Barrington Center for the Arts
A mentor/mentee exhibition by current Gordon College art majors and art alumni.
Matter and Substance
On Display: March 15–April 20, 2023
Reception: March 15, 4 p.m., Barrington Center for the Arts
A husband-and-wife retrospective by Theodore & Catherine Prescott.
About Theodore Prescott: Prescott’s approach to sculpture is rooted in his interest in the poetic and associative nature of material substances. He is versatile in the use of traditional sculptural materials like wood, stone and metals but has also employed unconventional materials like salt, coal and honey. The sculptural vocabulary of his work is derived from modernist art, but he seeks continuity with the past and does not see what is new as replacing or negating what has gone before. Prescott’s subject matter and ideas often draw upon the beliefs and ideas found in the Christian tradition.
About Catherine Prescott: It’s natural for me to turn things that move me into an image. When I am reading, thinking, listening or just looking, I constantly turn my perceptions into pictures in my mind.
I work primarily with portraits and care very much about getting a likeness, but accuracy in likeness is not enough; we all know there is more to a person than meets the eye. In what we see of someone’s face or hands or way of sitting, there are a thousand clues to the interior behind it. One might call it soft observation, unspoken and unproven, but nonetheless a history of feelings in the presence of a person. I love to make the most of those clues in my paintings.
I hope my work triggers some recognition of truth in another person and gives us access to each other. I hope that in knowing each other we can know that we are not alone.
2021–2022 Exhibitions
Selection from the Collections
Works aquired for the College Art Collections
1995 - 2020
October 2020 - January 2021
UN/RE-TOLD | Senior Thesis Exhibits | Class of 2020
August 28 - October 3, 2020
Click Here to view Virtual Gallery ➔
2018–2019 Exhibitions
Exempla: Gordon in Orvieto 20th Anniversary Exhibit
August 25–October 13, 2018
Enigma and Persona:
Mystery, Embodiment, and Presence
The Work of Elli Crocker and Sachiko Akiyama
On view: October 20–December 15, 2018
Reception: Saturday, October 20, 4–6 p.m.
Photographs by Stephan Gersh and Currents: Faculty Art Show
On view: January 16–February 23, 2019
Reception: Saturday, January 26, 4–6 p.m.
Remnant: Philip Archer
On view: March 9–April 24, 2019
Reception: Saturday, April 13, 4–6 p.m.
Senior Thesis Exhibits
On view: May 4–18, 2019
Reception: Saturday, May 4, 4–6 p.m.
Claire Roll
Samantha Fields
CIVA: Faces of Mercy
Stephen Watson
2016—2017 Exhibitions
Sadao Watanabe
Steve Prince
Vining Collection
Student / Alumni Collaboration
Bradford Johnson
2015—2016 Exhibitions
Grand Drumheller
Les Bartlett
Faculty Past/Present
Ed Stitt
Permanent Collection
Mark Potter
Ryan Stander
Field Visions: Masako Kamiya, Nathan Miner, and Lynda Schlosberg
2013—2014 Exhibitions
Faculty Alumni Recent Work
Kenneth Steinbach: The Machine in the Ghost
21st Century Monochrome
Wayne Adams is Speaking in Tongues
2012–2013 Exhibitions
Tim Harney: My Mother's Hands, My Father's Heart: Paintings and Collages, 2000–2012
Fiore/Drawing: The Drawings and Watercolors of Joseph A. Fiore
From my Book: Installations by Jay Walker
Monotype Guild of New England: 3rd National Juried Exhibition
QU4RTETS: Paintings by Bruce Herman and Makoto Fujimura
2011–2012 Exhibitions
Allison Luce: Ancient Expanse
Seeing Christ in the Darkness Georges Rouault as Graphic Artist
Work: Curse or Calling?
Trope & Trapeze: New Work by Edward Knippers
2010–2011 Exhibitions
Anaphora
Rose Olson: Color, Soft as Memory
Diane Ayott: Beyond Measure
Matthew Ballou: Redeeming Tensions
2009–2010 Exhibitions
Thaddeus Beal: Rhythm and (Re)Emergence
Drawing As Encounter
Tangible Dreams of a Dying Explorer
2008–2009 Exhibitions
Host & Hunger: Recent Work by Jim Zingarelli
Current Work: By Adjunct Art Faculty of Gordon College
Magnificat: Recent Work by Bruce Herman and Tanja Butler on the Life of the Virgin Mary
Russian Photography: From the Soviet Era to the 1990s
Looking Comes First
2007–2008 Exhibitions
Cross/Purpose
Susan Heideman: Approaching the Liminal
Field Report: Works by Members of The Boston Printmakers
2006–2007 Exhibitions
The Next Generation: Contemporary Images of Faith
Highly Favored: Contemporary Images of the Virgin Mary
Standing on One Foot (Work by Barbara Grad, Heejung Kim, Lauren O'Neal, and Jedediah Morfit)
House as a Fortress (Prints by Dan Steeves)
2005–2006 Exhibitions
Icon and Logos (Sandra Bowden Retrospective)
Sacra Conversazione (Work by Tanja Butler and Tyrus Clutter)
Archetype & Whimsy (Work by Erica Daborn, Donna Dodson, Renata Fryshara, Shaun McNiff, and Rob Roy)
Recent Work of Gordon Alumni (Michelle Arnold, Anthony Falcetta, Jon MacAdam, and Truitt Seitz)
Past Exhibitions
2017–2018 Exhibitions
CLAIRE ROLL
SAMANTHA FIELDS
CIVA: FACES OF MERCY
STEPHEN WATSON
2016–2017 Exhibitions
SADAO WATANABE
STEVE PRINCE
VINING COLLECTION
STUDENT / ALUMNI COLLABORATION
BRADFORD JOHNSON
2015–2016 Exhibitions
GRANT DRUMHELLER
LES BARTLETT
FACULTY PAST/PRESENT
ED STITT
2014–2015 Exhibitions
PERMANENT COLLECTION
MARK POTTER
RYAN STANDER
FIELD VISIONS: MASAKO KAMIYA, NATHAN MINER, AND LYNDA SCHLOSBERG
2013–2014 Exhibitions
FACULTY ALUMNI RECENT WORK
KENNETH STEINBACH: The Machine in the Ghost
21st CENTURY MONOCHROME
WAYNE ADAMS IS SPEAKING IN TONGUES
2012–2013 Exhibitions
TIM HARNEY: My Mother's Hands, My Father's Heart: Paintings and Collages, 2000–2012
FIORE/DRAWING: The Drawings and Watercolors of Joseph A. Fiore
FROM MY BOOK: Installations by Jay Walker
MONOTYPE GUILD OF NEW ENGLAND: 3rd National Juried Exhibition
QU4RTETS: Paintings by Bruce Herman and Makoto Fujimura
2011–2012 Exhibitions
ALLISON LUCE: Ancient Expanse
SEEING CHRIST IN THE DARKNESS: Georges Rouault as Graphic Artist
WORK: Curse or Calling?
TROPE & TRAPEZE: New Work by Edward Knippers
2010–2011 Exhibitions
ANAPHORA
ROSE OLSON: Color, Soft as Memory
DIANE AYOTT: Beyond Measure
MATTHEW BALLOU: Redeeming Tensions
2009–2010 Exhibitions
Thaddeus Beal: Rhythm and (Re)Emergence
Drawing As Encounter
Tangible Dreams of a Dying Explorer
2008–2009 Exhibitions
Host & Hunger: Recent Work by Jim Zingarelli
Current Work: By Adjunct Art Faculty of Gordon College
Magnificat: Recent Work by Bruce Herman and Tanja Butler on the Life of the Virgin Mary
Russian Photography: From the Soviet Era to the 1990s
Looking Comes First
2007–2008 Exhibitions
Cross/Purpose
Susan Heideman: Approaching the Liminal
Field Report: Works by Members of The Boston Printmakers
2006–2007 Exhibitions
The Next Generation: Contemporary Images of Faith
Highly Favored: Contemporary Images of the Virgin Mary
Standing on One Foot (Work by Barbara Grad, Heejung Kim, Lauren O'Neal, and Jedediah Morfit)
House as a Fortress (Prints by Dan Steeves)
2005–2006 Exhibitions
Icon and Logos (Sandra Bowden Retrospective)
Sacra Conversazione (Work by Tanja Butler and Tyrus Clutter)
Archetype & Whimsy (Work by Erica Daborn, Donna Dodson, Renata Fryshara, Shaun McNiff, and Rob Roy)
Recent Work of Gordon Alumni (Michelle Arnold, Anthony Falcetta, Jon MacAdam, and Truitt Seitz)