Annual Student Exhibition

Image: Michael Gorman, It's A Horse of Course? 2018, Shoe, Wire, Stool legs, Counter top and Rope

This year’s Annual Student Exhibition features work from across the Hite Art Institute’s extensive disciplinary range, from sculpture to print making, ceramics to design. It also highlights the conceptual and stylistic diversity of our talented students. But despite this diversity, certain thematic concerns are clear. The modernist design aesthetic of Lily Chalson’s skateboard and playful musical pairings, the fantastical found construction of Michael Gorman’s giraffe, and the recreational paraphilia of Mallory Lucus’ Chill Out suggest that this work is deeply concerned with the role of play in our daily lives. And yet Chill Out also hints at a darker side of play. Indeed if we read the title as a command, the work resonates with artwork in the exhibition that investigates boredom, anxiety and fear—artwork like Natalie Shain’s Dissociation, MadelineSchowalter’s Ofelia, and Samuel Wilding’s Untitled. Is this the binary state of our new ludic economy? Are we trapped between these inescapable positions: playing or bored; laughing or anxious?

The Annual Student Exhibition will be on view at the Cressman Center for Visual Arts from December 20-February 1, 2020.
A reception will be held on Friday January 24, 2019 from 6-8 pm.