But there are also \u201csofter\u201d takeaways whose value, in fact, may surpass career considerations and play directly into life satisfaction.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
There\u2019s the power of consultation, companionship, and collaboration, for example. \u201cEspecially in the first semester, we spent a lot of time looking at each other\u2019s work,\u201d says Flannery Black-Ingersoll of Concord, N.H., one of the 14 senior artists in this year\u2019s exhibition, which opens April 5<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cThat’s very instructional, both for how you look at your own art and what you ask questions about, but also building that camaraderie in the studio space,\u201d she says, meaning the Olin Arts Center studios that are each shared by several students. \u201c\u2018Okay, what do you think of this?\u2019 \u2018Is this ridiculous?\u2019 \u2018Do you have any ideas?\u2019 \u2014 sort of feeding off each other.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cIt\u2019s this nice bubble of artistry, which people look for beyond college.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n And then there are the lessons that are basically good for one thing, but a highly important thing: a laugh. Stuck at one point in her work, which involves fabric, ceramics, paint, and wood, Black-Ingersoll was inspired to try to integrate cheesecloth into the concept.<\/p>\n\n\n\n For her and studiomates Jo Cunningham and Daisy Diamond, cheesecloth was The Answer \u2014 until it wasn\u2019t. \u201cIt was late at night,\u201d says Black-Ingersoll. \u201cWe were all freaking out because we just had this genius moment. But of course it didn’t happen.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n That’s because she subsequently heard that a thing for cheesecloth is a typical developmental stage for first-year art school students. \u201cSo I didn’t end up doing that.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n At top, Daisy Diamond works with art, steel, and fabric in her Olin studio. At left, Grace Link ’19 hangs her photographs with help from Haley Crim ’19. At right, Mickai Mercer ’19 places his drawings in the art museum’s Upper Gallery. (Phyllis Graber Jensen\/Bates College)<\/p>\n\n\n\n Pamela Johnson, associate professor of art and visual culture, advised the senior artists during the winter semester, and Penelope Jones, visiting assistant professor of art, was the fall semester adviser.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Formalism and craftsmanship are important in Black-Ingersoll\u2019s artwork. Generally speaking, she makes two types of structural forms \u2014 quilted canvas wall hangings and wooden structures incorporating ceramic vessels and painted canvas \u2014 that both take abstracted nude self-portraits as subjects.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cI am not interested in developing sexualized imagery\u201d Black-Ingersoll says, but instead focuses on the human form as it appears in visual art and dance. She sketches, paints, and embroiders figures in a way akin to choreography. \u201cIn contrast with the ephemerality of dance, these figures have permanence,\u201d she says. As she does in her choreography, Black-Ingersoll infuses her art with humor and a sense of rebelliousness. \u201cThere’s something comical to me about depicting the nude female with embroidery,\u201d she says.<\/p>\n<\/div><\/div>\n\n\n\n Cunningham of Brooklyn, N.Y., confronts her own discomforts and anxieties in her paintings. Painting saggy skin and baggy eyes gives her the opportunity \u201cto explore a level of darkness and discomfort in the safety of the abstract and the fantasy of paint.\u201d She often paints babies, which \u201chave the saggy skin, puffy eyes and disproportionate bodies that I love\u201d \u2014 but \u201cthey are important. The creation of them and their appeal is fascinating to me.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n Because babies represent human potential, they are precious. Cunningham\u2019s paintings \u201cexplore the complexities of being this precious captive, and the discomfort of childhood.\u201d She depicts scenes where babies run amok, driving cars, lassoing cows, and creating general chaos. Her work is meant to unsettle and disturb. \u201cThe material and process are beautiful, but like artist Ida Applebroog said, the finished product is not meant to hang over the living room couch,\u201d she says.<\/p>\n<\/div><\/div>\n\n\n\n Ceramicist Daehler of Greensburg, Penn., aims to make vessels that will be valued \u201cfor their texture, beauty, and utility,\u201d she says. She places high value on craftsmanship: \u201cThe pieces I am most attracted to are ones that do not easily reveal their process,\u201d and Daehler strives to remove or conceal such evidence of pottery technique as throwing lines or fingerprints.<\/p>\n\n\n\n She’s also acutely conscious of the user experience, making vessels that are lightweight and a pleasure to handle. “Tactile sensation is an important part of my work,” she adds. She uses slip-trailing to speckle the surface with raised dots in random order. Inspired by the clean designs of Frank Lloyd Wright, Daehler glazes with white, which affords attractive effects of shadow and light, or with deep blues that allow “my slip-tailed dots to peek through, like stones peeking out of the water in a shallow stream.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div><\/div>\n\n\n\n With the goal of confronting systemic privilege and oppression, “I think about my sculptures as representations of invisible frameworks: penetrable webs of histories, symbols, and identities,” says Julia “Daisy” Diamond of Bala Cynwyd, Penn. Using sutures as a motif in pieces that also incorporate steel, fabric, clay, wax, thread, and animation, \u201cI want to understand and deconstruct my privileges, especially my whiteness, as historically created and maintained by violent assemblages of sutures.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n Her sculptures, says Diamond, \u201crepresent the way that whiteness is constructed by thousands of moments, stitches of affirmation, wobbly and waiting to unravel.\u201d But the sutures have more than one meaning. \u201cThe process of confronting myself in my work is not an easy, pain-free, linear process,\u201d she explains. “Sutures are a recurring visual element that I use to represent this experience as a step of healing.”<\/p>\n<\/div><\/div>\n\n\n\n \u201cUsing drawing and building as a liberatory practice,\u201d Jhajharia of Kolkata, India<\/span>, makes objects that he calls \u201cheadspaces.\u201d Constructed from everyday materials such as cardboard, wire, and beads, these miniature spaces invite the viewer to peer inside. \u201cThe interiors are both intricate and methodical, urging the viewer to explore the details and construct the hidden narratives,\u201d he says. \u201cDepth, perception, and light combine to challenge the reality of what is being viewed.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n Creating physical space is important to Jhajharia, who struggled to find his own place as a queer trans South Asian boy. \u201cIt was natural that the work I wanted to create took up the radical act of explicitly embodying myself,\u201d he says. \u201cEach headspace that I have made is significant to an experience I have lived, and each structure holds thoughts I have actually had.\u201d He asks his viewers to \u201cbe ready to reject an apolitical approach and instead challenge their beliefs on gender, race, caste, and societal norms.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div><\/div>\n\n\n\n Kip\u2019s oil paintings were born out of agitation and insight dating back to a time abroad, during which she missed nature in New England and felt alienated from her art-marking. Back at Bates, Kip of Needham, Mass., began a series of self-portraits with plants, but wasn\u2019t satisfied with those. Her current approach emerged when a friend advised her to \u201cpaint people holding the plant.\u201d This suggestion proved to be an effective way forward.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Humor is essential to the paintings, as is an appreciation of color. Along with bordering each of her portraits with a golden arch in the manner of an illuminated manuscript, Kip chose background colors corresponding to the relationship between painter and her subject. \u201cColor is critical to my conception of character, the same way that comportment or clothing can capture the essence of a person,\u201d says Kip.<\/p>\n<\/div><\/div>\n\n\n\n Lewis\u2019s drawings stem from his love for comics. \u201cI strive to emulate the dynamic movement that I see on these pages and craft an engrossing narrative,\u201d says Lewis of Nederland, Colo. \u201cIn my work I try to build new worlds that capture views of different kinds of space. Through the use of deep blacks and stark whites, I hope to create dynamic and eye-catching pieces that call for a closer look.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n Lewis doesn’t feel attracted to the ironic and cynical school of comics. In comics, \u201cwe see characters rise from tragedy and undergo many trials and tribulations throughout their lives. However, no matter how bleak these stories may seem, the message that they consistently send is that there are always good people in our world,\u201d he explains. \u201cWhen I was younger, I wanted to be Superman because I wanted to be strong and impervious for its own sake,\u201d he adds. \u201cA few years later I realized that there was an additional reason: He stands for hope.”<\/p>\n<\/div><\/div>\n\n\n\n Link\u2019s love of photography started with her first digital camera at age 10. Now she works exclusively in black-and-white film, finding that both the limitations of film and \u201cthe physical control that I have over image processing make me feel like I am creating art pieces instead of mere renditions of digital files.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n In the Senior Thesis Exhibition, Link of Montclair, N.J., is showing portraits of young adults. Most of the images are studio portraits taken against a plain background. \u201cMy goal is to present the emotions I see in each person in a short period of time,\u201d she says. The subjects, friends and strangers alike, choose to be photographed by Link by signing up online, which gives her the comfort of consent. \u201cThis develops trust between the subject and myself where I can respectfully represent them,\u201d she says. \u201cI want the hidden power of each person to be present in my portraits.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div><\/div>\n\n\n\n “Ever since I could first pick up a pencil, I was drawing on newspapers, books, Bibles, and any other type of paper I could get my hands on,” says Mercer, a Philadelphia resident. “My Nana got so irritated with me drawing on everything that she brought me my first sketchbook and took me to a museum.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n “Concepts of life, death, manifestation, human will, metaphysical space and experiences that can be relatable for everyone became the main topics I explore,” he explains. Mercer depicts his own face, plants, ravens and crows, wolves, and butterflies, viewing the animals as extensions of himself. Each image \u201cattempts to allude to a thought, emotion, or a shared experience,\u201d he says. Through a variety of media, subjects, and styles, Mercer has found ways to fully \u201cdive into this world of mystery and infinite possibilities.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div><\/div>\n\n\n\n Erica Hawley Moore\u2019s interest in depicting drawing, painting, and sculpting hands began as a challenge. \u201cThe hand is widely regarded as one of the more difficult body parts to depict,\u201d says Moore of Ho-Ho-Kus, N.J. Her foray into creating hands is neither easy nor comfortable. \u201cI tend to bounce back and forth between looking for meaning in this work and then deciding that it\u2019s not necessary to do so,\u201d she says. Ultimately, her discomfort allows her to create disjointed pieces that \u201cdo not have to make sense to be complete.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cI am making broken hands, pieces of hands, whole hands, hands linked together, hands alone, hands forming shapes, and hands in blank space. I have removed context from my work, to allow more focus on the form itself,\u201d she says. \u201cI have noticed more and more how crucial they are to my practice and how my appreciation for them has grown.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div><\/div>\n\n\n\n “My fascination with dragons is lifelong and deeply personal,” says Myers of Pawtucket, R.I., who has found inspiration in mythology, folklore and the works of J.R.R. Tolkien. In her installation “Broodmother,” she explains, “I’m investigating how my agency as an artist, a woman, and a feminist subverts the patriarchal and masculine toxicity historically associated with dragon iconography. My manipulation of this imagery effectively subverts that relationship.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n Her installation consists of sculptural objects arranged, in juxtapositions influenced by mountain ranges (the natural lair of dragons), to suggest dragon anatomy. “Fire is an indisputable aspect of dragon iconography,” Myers notes, and she uses heat-worked materials like clay, metal, and glass, and also selects washes and colors to create \u201ca volcanic surface quality,\u201d as ways to evoke expanses freshly scorched by dragon fire.<\/p>\n<\/div><\/div>\n\n\n\n As she considered subjects for her paintings, Richins of Westerly, R.I., thought of visits to her grandmother’s house before and after her grandmother moved to a new home. Richins recalled the quality of light and the significance of the objects in the bathroom. \u201cAfter contemplating what was missing from and what remained of the space, I became aware of a bathroom\u2019s significance as one of the most personally revealing rooms in a home,\u201d she says.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Now she uses representational paintings of bathrooms to “examine how an unoccupied space can be activated by human energy and natural light,\u201d she says. She has a particular interest in the contrast between warm and cool light and how each falls on neutral objects. \u201cWith the hope of accurately representing the temperature of light, I challenged myself to ignore what colors I instinctively associate with an object and instead mixed paint to reflect what my eyes actually perceive,\u201d Richins says.<\/p>\n<\/div><\/div>\n\n\n\n![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.bates.edu\/news\/files\/2019\/04\/190320_Olin_Art_Studio_0279.jpg\")
<\/a>![\"\"\/](\"https:\/\/www.bates.edu\/news\/files\/2019\/04\/190320_Olin_Art_Studio_0454-900x600.jpg\")
<\/figure>\n<\/figure>\n\n\n\n![\"\"\/](\"https:\/\/www.bates.edu\/news\/files\/2019\/04\/190401_Senior_Art_Exhibition_Installation_0073-900x600.jpg\")
<\/figure>\n\n\n\n![\"\"\/](\"https:\/\/www.bates.edu\/news\/files\/2019\/04\/190402_Mickai_Mercer_Museum_Installation_0127_A-900x600.jpg\")
<\/figure>\n<\/figure>\n\n\n\n2019 Senior Thesis Exhibition artists<\/h5>\n\n\n\n
+<\/span>Flannery Black-Ingersoll \u201919<\/a><\/h4>
![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.bates.edu\/news\/files\/2019\/04\/SenEx19_Black-Ingersoll_LR-900x518.jpg\")
+<\/span>Jo Cunningham \u201919<\/a><\/h4>
![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.bates.edu\/news\/files\/2019\/04\/SenEx19_Cunningham_LR-900x757.jpg\")
+<\/span>Sarah Daehler \u201919<\/a><\/h4>
![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.bates.edu\/news\/files\/2019\/04\/SenEx19_Daehler_LR-900x721.jpg\")
+<\/span>Daisy Diamond \u201919<\/a><\/h4>
![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.bates.edu\/news\/files\/2019\/04\/SenEx19_Diamond_LR-900x600.jpg\")
+<\/span>Meha Jhajharia \u201919<\/a><\/h4>
![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.bates.edu\/news\/files\/2019\/04\/SenEx19_Meha_LR-675x900.jpg\")
+<\/span>Lily Kip \u201919<\/a><\/h4>
![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.bates.edu\/news\/files\/2019\/04\/SenEx19_Kip_LR-450x900.jpg\")
+<\/span>Morgan Lewis \u201919<\/a><\/h4>
![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.bates.edu\/news\/files\/2019\/04\/SenEx19_Lewis_LR-900x790.jpg\")
+<\/span>Grace Link \u201919<\/a><\/h4>
![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.bates.edu\/news\/files\/2019\/04\/SenEx19_Link_LR-600x900.jpg\")
+<\/span>Mickai Mercer \u201919<\/a><\/h4>
![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.bates.edu\/news\/files\/2019\/04\/SenEx19_Mercer_LR-900x875.jpg\")
+<\/span>Hawley Moore \u201919<\/a><\/h4>
![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.bates.edu\/news\/files\/2019\/04\/SenEx19_Moore_LR-900x900.jpg\")
+<\/span>Abby Lynne Kizirian Myers \u201919<\/a><\/h4>
![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.bates.edu\/news\/files\/2019\/04\/SenEx19_Myers_LR-600x900.jpg\")
+<\/span>Bailey Richins \u201919<\/a><\/h4>
![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.bates.edu\/news\/files\/2019\/04\/SenEx19_Richins_LR-900x747.jpg\")
![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.bates.edu\/news\/files\/2019\/04\/SenEx19_Ryan_LR-695x900.jpg\")
![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.bates.edu\/news\/files\/2019\/04\/SenEx19_Tran_LR-616x900.jpg\")