Eastern Oregon University > Academics > Senior exhibition: “A Body of Work”

Senior exhibition: “A Body of Work”

“A Body of Work” opens Friday, May 5 with a reception for the artists from 6-8 p.m. in Nightingale Gallery in Loso Hall.

“A Body of Work” opens Friday, May 5 with a reception for the artists from 6-8 p.m. in Nightingale Gallery in Loso Hall.

Students showcase “A Body of Work” for final senior exhibition of spring

Contact: Cory Peeke, Nightingale Gallery Director, 541-962-3584

LA GRANDE, Ore. April 24, 2017 – Eastern Oregon University’s Nightingale Gallery presents the final senior capstone exhibition of spring term featuring graduating art majors Sarah Anderson, Jasmine Brookshire and Crystal Rainwater.

Entitled “A Body of Work,” the exhibit opens Friday, May 5 with a reception for the artists from 6-8 p.m., and encompasses a variety of works including sculpture, drawing and photography.

The ever-changing categorization of what is socially acceptable influences the work of these three artists. Their show incorporates the theme of escaping from social constructs of modern reality, and the diversity of the exhibit addresses issues within modern culture of social justice, personal image and the expression of the imagination.

About the artists

Sarah Anderson, of La Grande, creates puppets from classic and reimagined characters of myth, aiming to make them as close to scale as possible to the original size of the creature that inspired them. Focusing as much on the act of creating the body as finding the life in an inherently lifeless form, the effort put into a work – by both the artist and the viewer – is the defining character of the piece for Anderson.

Often incorporating real bone and fur into her pieces, Anderson tends to focus on the more morbid or off-putting tales as a way of better including the viewer by playing to their more basic and overwhelming survival instincts. Anderson chose puppets as a way to engage both herself and the viewer in an experience that exists in and outside of reality.

Jasmine Brookshire, also of La Grande, layers together different parts of the human form to create figure drawings in charcoal and chalk pastel. The figural gesture drawings take a variety of parts of the human forms’ anatomy in order to create a new human form. The work takes away the sense of the individual as the portions of people are put together, regardless of race or gender, to create a sense of equality.

For Brookshire, the process of creating the figures serves as a way to describe the invention of one’s sense of self. The human need to categorize individuals into groups to create a further sense of separation is a historical human trait that influences the process of the work, which acts as a way for Brookshire to process her own categorization in her life.

Crystal Rainwater, of Richland, Ore., uses medium format film to create self-portrait photographs. With these black and white and color photographs, she explores the relationship between the private individual’s comfort and the public burden of beauty expected of 21st century women.

For Rainwater, this process allows her to liberate herself from societal ideals and embrace the beauty along with the comfort of the nude form. The images bring to mind the idea of lounging odalisque women from a forgotten time, yet also convey a contemporary feel that comments on self-acceptance of beauty that takes place in a time where physical appearances and their standards are elevated.

See “A Body of Work” through May 26 in the Nightingale Gallery in Loso Hall at EOU.

Gallery hours are 11 a.m. to 4 p.m., Monday through Friday. For more information, go to www.eou.edu/art or follow the Nightingale Gallery on Facebook and Instagram.

Image detail