Dreams, awe and shadows

Our latest exhibits here at the Ross Museum focus on memories, half-hidden and fleeting, in a variety of ways. Husband and wife artists Elizabeth and John Fergus-Jean present installation, photographs and photos on metal in varying themes that all deal with our memory.

Elizabeth Fergus-Jean has installed Dreamscape in the Kuhlman Gallery, featuring real branches festooned with paperclay canoes to transport the viewer.


John Fergus-Jean invites the viewer into the hallway with a modern take on a 19th century photographic technique in his exhibit Penumbrae and layers multiple images into a shadowy new viewpoint.


Elizabeth Fergus-Jean shares her photography under her pseudonym Izze Frances in the West Gallery, presenting black and white images of classic spots around the world in a dreamlike style under the title Awe.

All three exhibits are open until 5pm on Thursday, December 18th, so please stop by for a visit!

Wonder at our Metamorphosis

2 new exhibits, both exciting and diverse!

First off, we have The Wonder of it All by Clark Winter '73, a collection of photographs large and small, scattered salon-style on our walls, plus a looping video.








Then we have Metamorphosis, which includes the painted fabric constructions of Pamela Becker '64, plus her meticulous baskets, as well as photocollages and nature photography.




Both exhibits will be on view until November 2nd, so be sure to stop by anytime the Open flag is flying!

Fall 2014 - Art Everywhere!

It's a new academic year, and Fall 2014 is underway! There are 4 excellent exhibitions up and open for all to enjoy.

In the Ross Museum, we have 2 alumni exhibitors: Chris Kahler '91: Chris Kahler: Two Decades and Jim Zivic '83: Tightrope: The Line Between Art and Design.

Jim shares his drawings, plans, photographs, furniture and sculpture in the Kuhlman Gallery, and in the Mayhew and West Galleries, we have Chris' paintings.



In Gallery 2001 on the first floor of Beeghly Library, John Sabraw has created a new series for the 2014 Sagan National Colloquium on the theme of Water. John uses minerals from the run-off of mining to create beautiful pigments.


In Mowry Alumni Center, the work of Ann Seiler O'Brien '69 is on display on both floors. Ann uses egg tempera and acrylic to create her abstracts and landscapes.

Summer at the Ross

School's out, and we're enjoying our summertime exhibit, the QSDS (Quilt Surface Design Symposium) Invitational art quilt exhibit! Quilts from all over the U.S. plus Israel and Australia, showcasing the creativity of the medium. Our summer hours are Sunday, Tuesday, Wednesday, 1-5pm, Thursdays 1-7pm. We'll be open thru July 3rd, so stop on by!

(image: Mary Ann Tipple and her artwork)

New Art/New Mexico

26 artists from New Mexico are very well represented in our newest exhibit! We opened yesterday, albeit still putting a few finishing touches on things.

Tomorrow (Thursday, February 13th) one of the artists, Nancy Sutor, will be giving the Keynote Address at 4:10pm in Room 121 in Edgar Hall, which is just across the street. There is also a reception from 4:30-6:30pm in the museum.

Throughout the length of the exhibition, which runs until March 30th, there will be more visiting artists from the show. Unfortunately, we couldn't arrange for every artist to come to Ohio, but their work is magnificent and speaks for itself!

So many disciplines of art-making are represented: Painting, monoprinting, photography, ceramics, jewelry, metal sculpture, collage, drawing. There are 154 works to inspire and awe!

The Color of Money

Gallery 2001 in Beeghly Library is the place for our newest exhibit, Confederate Currency: The Color of Money by John W. Jones.

Mr. Jones will be on campus Tuesday, February 18th to give an illustrated talk in the Bayley Room of Beeghly library at 7pm, to be followed by a reception in the Gallery.

Mr. Jones talks about this exhibit:

[this] is a journey that started in 1996 while working as a graphic artist at a blueprint company in Charleston. After enlarging a Confederate bank note for a customer, I found myself looking at a picture of slaves picking cotton. Intrigued and excited, I started researching and documenting the use of slaves on Confederate and Southern states money. I was astonished by the widespread use of slaves on these currencies, and even more shocked by the absence of this information in any history books. The engravings on the bills are so small, that unless you were looking for them, you would miss them...

I decided to bring these engravings to light, as an addition to my series of paintings of the African American experience. I present the engravings as originally portrayed on the currencies without revision. I have used my colorful acrylics on canvas to bring the paintings back to life, and to extract from the dehumanizing engravings, the essential humanity of their subject matter... My hope is that the exhibition "The Color of Money" will inspire meaningful conversation on these issues and somehow help to heal our wounds.

John W. Jones Columbia, South Carolina