The “Mend the Gap” senior art showcase is currently on display, featuring 25 senior studio art Bachelor of Fine Arts majors, each focusing on a wide variety of personal themes.
The exhibit is split into two sections due to the number of graduating artists. The displays are hosted at the Smith Gallery in the Schaefer Center for the Performing Arts and the Cathy P. Walling Gallery in Wey Hall. Part one takes place from Nov. 10-19, with a reception on the final day from 5-7 p.m. Part two is open from Dec. 5-12, with a reception Dec. 11 from 5-7 p.m.
“This is the first studio BFA exhibition that we’ve had that’s been across the two spaces that the gallery now occupies,” Jennie Carlisle, director and curator of the Smith Gallery, said.
Carlisle said she works collaboratively with the students to ensure the exhibition interacts with the public.
“This is a show that’s got enormous range, and it’s really been wonderful to see the students explore such meaningful parts of, like, personal research that they have and to think about how to share that out,” Carlisle said.
Featured in part one of the exhibition, Evie Byers, a senior studio art major, explained that the title “Mend the Gap” was chosen to encompass all the different points of view from their senior class’s pieces.
Byers said their piece focuses on mending the gap between their identity, specifically in creating a standalone name as an artist. They find their journey in college to support their individualism.
“For me, it’s mending gaps between generations as a fourth-generation artist,” Byers said.
Byers’ piece, titled “Four in a Row,” represents their family’s history in art, as their mom, grandma and great grandma all specialized in it, with Byers being the first to get a degree in studio art.
Alejandra Gaytan, a senior studio art major, will also be focusing on family through a different lens. Their focus is on personal care, creating a series of self-care items on a large scale, including a 6-foot hairbrush and a 5-foot toothbrush.
“The main resonating theme in mine is rituals and resiliency, but I’m thinking a lot about, like, self-care,” Gaytan said. “I come from Mexican parents, and I am a U.S.-born child, and just seeing the current political climate and everything that’s going on with ICE — and you know, Mexican communities are really strongly affected at this given moment.”
Gaytan wants to establish a sense of community throughout their work which they found through daily rituals.
“I’m trying to create something that’s grounding and connecting us all as people, and that is just daily rituals, you know, having gratitude for the rituals that I can take on and creating a sense of culture in a way,” Gaytan said.
Bugz Gallimore, a senior studio art major, will be featured in the second part of the exhibition alongside Gaytan.
Gallimore said they examine identity as a non-binary, multidisciplinary artist. Their work explores the fluid nature of personal identity, queerness and its abstraction as well as their intersection with mental health.
Gallimore’s piece is a bedroom installation made entirely out of clay and mixed media, including a life-size clay portrait of themself in the nude, other life-size abstract sculptures and a small monster.
“It’s going to be like a landscape for my identity and where I find comfort, and also touches on my own mental health and my struggles with my cycle,” Gallimore said. “I also would like to have the viewer face a trans person bleeding and have that be normal.”
Gallimore said they found the final showcase to have a healing effect on them as it provided an outlet for self-expression and reflection.
“I have premenstrual period disorder, and I also was recently diagnosed with endometriosis, and like, that’s validated a lot of my
issues throughout life,” Gallimore said. “So I would say that is, like, what my body of work is mostly about.”
Carlisle applauded the young artists’ vulnerability through each piece. “This show has got a lot of different ideas that are embedded in it that I’ve not ever seen from a group of artists out on our campus, and so that’s been pretty exciting too,” Carlisle said.
After finishing the final art pieces of their collegiate career, some of the artists found themselves reflecting on their experiences at App State, especially regarding their lack of an art building.
“We’re a very resilient class; like, people have made such insane work despite everything. Whether we’re in a dorm room or a proper studio, this is a class that can make some really good work no matter where we are,” Byers said.
Gaytan also reflected on their college experience and feels optimistic about their life outside of App State. They said they’ve seen personal growth as an artist, and they’re ready to graduate and find new opportunities to take on work in their “never-ending journey.”
“I still do think that maybe if we had had a secure place the entire time, I wonder where my work would be, but I think that those lessons I’ve learned in turn have helped me as an artist,” Byers said.
