Within and Without (Senior Studio Art Majors Exhibition 2020)
May 1 – 17, 2020
Melvin Henderson-Rubio Gallery
Each spring, the Hallie Ford Museum of Art features the work of senior art majors at Willamette University. The exhibition represents the culmination of their four years at Willamette.
Characterized by a wide variety of styles and approaches, the exhibition features work in a variety of media.
Due to COVID-19, this year's senior art major exhibition is unable to be held in the Melvin Henderson-Rubio gallery and has been moved to an online presentation format. We invite you to experience their projects by clicking on their exhibition pages below.
This year’s senior art students include:
Joya Biebel (Nevada City, CA)
Joya Biebel is a storyteller who layers together film, mixed media, animation, and drawing to create new worlds and perspectives. Inspired by feminism and the LGBTQ+ community, she engages with themes of perceived identity and the fluidity of society. Much of her work uses the playful aesthetics of pop art, genre, camp, comics, and animation as tools to delve deeper into society and how we are programmed to understand the world we live in.
Clara Boline (Boise, ID)
Clara Boline is an expert button-pusher; encouraging confrontation with the terrifying, ghastly, exposed flesh of the human form. By utilizing silicone, oil and acrylic paints, Clara engages the audience to indulge in unique, flesh-like textures that are intended to evoke feelings of curiosity and unease. Humans are a superficial species, and the sight of nakedness can harbor feelings of excitement, disgust, or simply confusion. Dissecting the body, as well as the mind, gives way to understanding why certain aspects of the human form can either elicit viewer interaction, or repulsion. Born and raised in a hunting family in Boise, Idaho, Clara enjoys the typically morose. Her work has been shown in galleries in both Salem, OR and Boise, ID. Clara’s clean and almost surgical work encapsulates both 2-dimensional and 3-dimensional human forms. Bored of the typical gallery experience, Clara endeavors to fuse classic styles of painting with interactive protruding elements. Perfection can be found in the human body, especially when it is taken apart.
Bailey Dickey (Las Vegas, NV)
To be a person of color in America is to live under the constant scrutiny of the white gaze. In Bailey Dickey’s work, young people of color take center stage. These individuals are her peers, existing in a primarily white institution in which it is all too easy for their presence to be erased or overlooked. However, in this form, they exist as imposing, larger-than-life figures, their eyes locked on yours as you pass them by. They hold the power, returning your gaze, placing critical attention back onto you as the viewer. In a wall of solid color background, these individuals refuse to be defined by their surroundings or to be lost in the white of the exhibition space. Instead, they take up both physical and visual space, commanding your attention.
Haley Macke (Napa, CA)
Haley Macke is an artist that believes that art is a form of universal communication that allows for deeper and more meaningful understanding. As a visual learner, her art represents the way she sees and processes the world. She believes that the narratives she wants to display can’t always be portrayed in one medium and instead often uses a multimedia approach to her practice. Instead, identifying more with shape and texture to convey content and complex narratives. She's inspired by objects and materials that have their own stories embedded in them, whether that be found objects or organic materials. Her goal is to tell her own stories as a way to connect with others on a more intersectional level and start conversations on the topics of women's experience.
Andrew Nelson (Irvine, CA)
Andrew Nelson is an artist who explores the depiction of current events in the world onto pieces of art. He works in the mediums of wood, clay, metal, cardboard, photography and paints. Throughout his work there is an emphasis on the natural world. The works of art depict a dystopian future as well as the causes, which makes the viewer question the world. Andrew Nelson once said, “I make art to stimulate the viewer, I want them to associate my art with the natural world and to discover on their own how much of an effect humans are having on the planet.”
Claire Annalee Read (Salem, OR)
Claire Read takes much of her inspiration from nature. She focuses primarily on the little things, the seemingly unassuming moments. Things that most people let pass them by such as a water droplet nestled in a patch of moss or even a little worm venturing outside after the rain. As someone who creates through observation and collecting Read continues to think of new processes of thinking and seeing. She works in multimedia, whatever form best serves a specific piece. The amazing part of art is that there are so many ways to create and display work, both classic and unconventional, that she finds useful. There is so much that exists unseen by most and Read wants to keep her eyes open.
Financial Support
Financial support for the exhibition was provided by general operating support grants from the City of Salem's Transient Occupancy Tax funds and the Oregon Arts Commission.
