Current Exhibitions

Debris

Rachel Eng
Mar 11 – Nov 12 , 2023

Rachel Eng depicts geology’s change, decay, and regeneration over time in Debris, a new, unfired clay installation. Commenting on life cycles and the impact natural elements and humans have on the environment, Eng demonstrates how we can understand our future by studying the planet’s past.

Eng grew up exploring the deciduous forests of Rochester, New York. This inspired her work which grapples with environmental concepts such as climate change, land use, and development, and how each can be connected to memory. Eng received her B.F.A. from the Pennsylvania State University and her M.F.A. from the University of Colorado at Boulder. She has completed several artist residencies, both national and international, and was selected as the National Council on Education for the Ceramic Arts Emerging Artist in 2017. She currently works and lives in Carlisle, PA with her family and teaches in the studio art program at Dickinson College.

Dish

Laura Tanner Graham
Dec 3, 2022–Spring 2023

Featuring new work by Laura Tanner Graham, Dish presents a visual archive of the rituals, recipes, and traditions of different communities around the country. By exploring each community’s unique foodways, Tanner Graham examines and highlights the ways food can be used to better understand a community’s economy, social structure, political leanings, and, ultimately, its people.

Through her captivating drawings and installations, Laura Tanner Graham seeks to uncover the edits and omissions take from dominant historical narratives through the lens of a Southern female perspective.

Since receiving her MFA from the University of Illinois in Urbana-Champaign, Tanner Graham has shown work in several national exhibitions. She serves as the Producer and Co-Host of The Open Call, a podcast featuring conversations with contemporary artists. Originally from Georgia, Tanner Graham now resides in Boca Raton, Florida where she is currently an Assistant Professor in the Department of Visual Arts and Art History at Florida Atlantic University.

Mirror Mirror

Oct 22, 2022– Mar 19, 2023

Mirror Mirror looks at contemporary women artists who focus on issues of identity – as a woman, artist, mother, wife, and/or daughter. Curated by Dr. Christine Fowler Shearer, this exhibition brings together 60 works by artists around the country. Mirror Mirror was organized by Fowler Artistic and the Springfield Museum of Art.

Opening reception with lite bites, cash bar, and curator remarks: Saturday, Oct 22, 6-7:30pm

This project is supported in part by the National Endowment for the Arts.
National Endowment for the Arts

Wild & Tenacious

Beth Edwards
Oct 1, 2022 – Apr 23, 2023

Beth Edwards meticulously captures every minute detail of nature’s foliage and flora in this series of hyper-realistic, magnified paintings of floral bouquets and garden oases. Painting with a vibrancy matched only by real life, Edwards seeks to preserve the fleeting colors, light, shadows, and negative spaces that imbue the natural world.

Beth Edwards is a full-time artist working in Memphis, Tennessee. She received her BFA from the Tyler School of Art in Philadelphia, and her MFA from Indiana University. With a career spanning over 30 years, Edwards has earned multiple awards, grants, and commissions. She has exhibited and taught in several states across the U.S., including at the University of Dayton and University of Memphis.

Lake Valley by Rachel Rose

Sep 17, 2022 – Feb 26, 2023

Our next collaboration with Art Bridges, Rachel Rose’s Lake Valley is a film installation combining collage, found footage, and repurposed materials. Together, the fantastical scenes Rose creates serve as the setting for a narrative tale in which a lonely, rabbit-like pet explores a nearby forest while looking for friendship. Object on loan from Art Bridges.

In collaboration with


 

Radical Imagination

Through November 2022

Images and language are powerful and can change the way we see the world. This new, interactive exhibition encourages us to use our imaginations as radically as possible to envision the kind of world in which we want to live. Radical Imagination features artwork from the permanent collection including colorful imagery by Nan Hass Feldman, a large scale painting by Angelo Ippolito, and rarely seen works by Elijah Pierce.

Along with the art is a selection of poetry inspired by the reading curriculum of Springfield City School District middle schools where students are exploring the power of language.

Unconventional: Self-Taught Artists of the Permanent Collection

Dec 18, 2021 – Nov 13, 2022

Unconventional presents several works in the Springfield Museum of Art’s permanent collection created by self-taught artists, many of whom were from Ohio. Comprising both two- and three-dimensional objects, this exhibition explores the wide variety of techniques, styles, themes, and materials that make up self-taught art. Artists on display include William Hawkins, Levent Isik, Mary Frances Merrill, and Elijah Pierce.

Celebrating Women: Female Artists from the Permanent Collection (Quinlan & Bosca Galleries)

On display from Jul 15, 2020 into 2022

Historically, female artists have been underrepresented in museum collections and are shown at significantly lower rates than their male counterparts. During the 100th anniversary of women’s suffrage, the Museum is highlighting female artists whose works are in the permanent collection. These works of art showcase the wide range of media, subject, and technique with which female artists have traditionally worked and demonstrate how women continue to conceptually advance the art world today. Featuring work by well-known and lesser known artists alike, this show explores artistic contributions of female artists, not only regionally, but nationally and internationally as well. Artists in the show include Davira Fisher, Frances Hynes, Helen Bosart Morgan, Aminah Robinson, Alice Schille, Kara Walker, and Stella Waitzkin, to name a few.

In addition to new art on display, the Museum has been awarded a grant from Smithsonian Affiliations. Funding for this project allows us to host a Smithsonian speaker in support of their American Women’s History Initiative taking place this year.