By Wade Walker
The Fine Arts Gallery at Colorado State University-Pueblo currently showcases work from the senior art students. titled Senior Show, the exhibits include a wide range of media from the art department’s most promising young talent. Throughout April, their works are on display during normal gallery hours with a semester wrap party taking place on May 5th, from 5-7 p.m. The event is free to the public and food and refreshments will be served.
“It’s an opportunity to celebrate the students and for the community, their family and the rest of campus to see what they do and see all the work that they spent so much time on through the last few semesters.” Caroline Peters, CSU-Pueblo assistant professor of art, said.
Diversity is a key focus of the art program and the students are using the Senior Show as an opportunity to present the wide range of their talent. Paintings, photography, sculpture and pottery are just some of the media used in the show and it represents how multifaceted these artists are.
Many great artists have a fascination with nature and Edward Doyle is no different. Featuring works ranging from a sea turtle tea set to neon dragonflies in skulls, his passion for biology crosses paths with philosophy. In his painting titled Altered Life, a death’s head moth stands in contrast to a beautiful purple butterfly that represents “a balance between good and evil.” He says that moths, the death’s head in particular, fall victim to an ill-deserved stigma and that the insect once enjoyed an almost deity-like status among ancient cultures. In contrast, he claims a butterfly represents death but in a pretty package.
“The death’s head moth is a beautiful moth that has a lot more to it than just death.” He said.
Some students find that the program brings out the artist within them. Joyce Pretzer’s diverse collection includes mandalas, rustic photography and. Her more eclectic works include a lamp made of florite and a clay ball formed into ocean currents. She also specializes in Raku, a form of Japanese pottery traditionally used for drinking bowls. Her work represents a student exploring dynamic art to find her style. With such a diverse range of media, assumptions could be made that Pretzer has been an artist her whole life. Nothing could be further from the truth as she claims that she never considered art as a career.
“I’ve never thought of myself as an artist but it turns out, I am.” she said.
The process has been one of discovery for Pretzer. As a non-traditional student, she has wisdom on her side and it has allowed her to develop her craft into a very sophisticated style. She says it has been a journey and that the Senior Show comprises the culmination of her education. She says of her sculpture titled Flowing, a tree with symmetrical, silver beads hanging in rows like a cascading gate to Eden, “it’s the first piece that turned out like I planned.”
Some artists find inspiration from tragedy. Molly Moreschini found a way to channel the loss of her parents into a collection of photos that are both provocative and inspiring. In a series of harrowing images, she channeled the nightmares she has suffered from since the loss of her parents into a stimulating and sometimes terrifying chronicle of a woman struggling through crippling grief.
“My art is my therapy, I would write down my nightmares, a lot of them were about drowning or being stuck and this was my way of dealing with them.” she said.
Diversity is key to the Senior Show and Morescheni follows that tradition. In one of her pictures from the Toxic Series, she depicts a mother and daughter in gasmasks, holding each other on a train track, pointing towards the distance. The powerful work suggests a not too distant future which provokes feelings of dread at the prospect of unsustainability.
“It’s about the future, what the children are going to have to live in, what they are going to have to live through, are we as providers setting them up for a good life.” she said.
