Current Exhibits

Osaze Was a Freedom Fighter

Curated by Bruxas Bruxas

November 5 - November 7 | HUB Gallery

Osaze Was a Freedom Fighter is an exhibition of works by student artists and activists. These individuals are a part of Bruxas Bruxas, a student organization founded by both artists and Ph.D. candidates in Art Education, Women, Gender, and Sexuality studies, and African American studies. Bruxas Bruxas works to address race, gender, oppression, community, and allyship through its arts praxis. These student leaders are using the gallery to create space for expression and response to the tragic incident in which State College police ended the life of a 29-year-old black man, Osaze Osagie, in the spring of 2019. The exhibition will, for three days, serve as a space for members of the Penn State community to remember Osagie and to advance civil discourse surrounding police responses resulting in fatality for people with mental disabilities and people of color.

A Meditation on this Age of Struggle and Strife

Rudy Shepherd

August 5 – November 10 |  Art Alley

Shepherd’s content is picked from the endless stream of news we are all flooded with on a day to day basis, stories of special poignance that tend to speak to a larger trend in the culture. On display in the space are nearly 100 faces and events made present and notorious in the news cycle from 2017 to last week. A Meditation on this Age of Struggle and Strifeplaces images next to one another: criminals, victims of crime, politicians, heroes, artists and Shepherd’s friends and family. Portraits of people whose names become familiar to those following the United States, that accumulate through Shepherd’s dedicated painting practice into a monumental grid of people side by side. For instance, Megan Rapinoe, Bree Newsome, Antwon Rose, Kamasi Washington, John McCain, and Lil Peep hang together and share space in the gallery alongside a limousine burned by the Black Bloc during the presidential inauguration (2017). Part of an ongoing body of work Shepherd began investigating the poignant, sensational, and often despair filled stories of major American news outlets. Spurred from the actions of the media that perpetrate prejudice, he began to examine the “dark side of human nature, that part of all of us that cause us to mistreat and distrust one another.” 

Ghosts

October 3 - February 2 | Display Cases

Reception: October 16, 4:00 p.m. – 6:00 p.m.

Ghosts is  an exhibition of works selected from the CeramicsArea’s collection of bisqueware, known as the Bisque Library. Bisquewareis clay that has been kiln fired once and has no chemically bonded water remaining in it. Clay can be fired a second time at a higher temperature for a glaze, or glass surface, that is often referred to as “finished.”Ghostsare a colloquial way to reference ceramics made during demonstrations and workshops that were never intended to be finished. Instead, they were made as an instructional tool to show students and publics the “how to” side of the artist’s practice. This exhibition is an invitation to explore the variety of forms and numerous approaches to handling clay. Notably, none of the artists are identified- the origins of these works may only be known by the maker themselves, or in the memory of a workshop attendee. As a library for the Ceramics Area, the pots are typically kept in open, available spaces for learners to interact with.