The 28th annual juried Student Exhibition opened Sunday evening at the David Winton Bell Gallery in List Art Center. Co-sponsored by the Department of Visual Art and the Bell Gallery, this exciting and expertly curated show features some 40 student artists working in a variety of media.
At about half the size of the juried exhibition, the Reject Show 2008, which presents works turned down by the juried exhibition, is also running nearby in List Art Center's lobby and second-floor gallery. This is the second year a formal reject show has taken place.
According to a department press release, the jurors for the Student Exhibition were Murray McMillan and Anne Tait, both artists and professors at Roger Williams University. They awarded the Minnie Helen Hicks Prizes in Art to Women Students to Jesse Cohn '10, Alice Malone '08, Megan Billman '09 and Mary MacGill '10. The Gilbert Stuart Prizes in Art went to David Lloyd '08, John Szymanski '09 and Alex Rosenbaum '08.
Cohn's untitled installation, a deceptively complex construction of translucent wires suspended in shimmering Cartesian grids through the air, is itself reason enough to visit the exhibition.
Aside from the prize-winning works, standouts include David Watson Sobel's '08 two eerily unpopulated photographs, Katrina Lencek-Inagaki's '08 multimedia work "Sonic Hunt" and Victoria Roth's '08 stunning double portrait, "Mr. and Mrs. Mathijsen."
The Reject Show feels a little slight but provides an intriguing counterpoint to its partner show and, at times, a welcome intimacy. The focus is on drawn and painted works, many of which unquestionably hold their own in comparison to the juried pieces. Viewed together, the Student Exhibition and Reject Show represent well the vibrancy and diversity of student art currently being created at Brown.
Both shows run until March 30.
