Menageries of meanings

CHRISTINE RYAN / contributing photographer "Sea Change" by graduate student Jeff Hoodock expresses his personal reaction to the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11. Hoodock is one of the 10 graduate student artists featured in the Graduate Student Show at Zirkle House.

From eye-catching paintings spanning entire walls to somber photography to ceramic underwear, a visual menagerie enlightens, provokes and entertains at Zirkle House. Ten artists are featured in the Graduate Student Show at Zirkle House through Dec. 7.

The show has no central theme, allowing the artists' subject matter to epitomize their personal musings.

"These works are representative of where [the grad students] are right now," artist Julie Singer said.

A striking piece, "Adam and Eve," by Matt Parker is impressive in its sheer size. Mainly in primary colors, it is reminiscent of Fauvist paintings, evoking a visceral response from the viewer. Set in a series of four canvases, the narrative alludes to the creation story of Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden ironically, with the main figures replaced with primitive, evolutionary forms. The foreground and background are awash with color and abstract forms, allowing the distinct figures to stand out more. Also, the viewer can pick up on details that the artist sprinkles through the piece, for example, the image of a fish.

One of the more provocative pieces is "Sea Change," by Jeff Hoodock. He created this mixed media piece in reaction to the events of Sept. 11. The image of the American flag is implied in the work to symbolize all the flags he has seen since the events. He incorporates steel with shattered glass, representing the different reactions to Sept. 11 as time progresses. "[The work] is open-ended in nature of 'what will happen next?' — almost a sick feeling," Hoodock said.

Two of the more entertaining displays are complementary ceramic pieces, "#35 Here I Am Trying to Find a Real Sweety" and "#97 Hopeless Romantic Searching," by Miho Hiro. In these displays, ceramic underwear surround a personal ad mounted against a mirror. In "#35," the personal ad is searching for a woman, and in "#97," a woman is looking for a "good man." These works portray the process of getting to know people and forming relationships in the modern era by comparing that process to online shopping.
"I wanted to represent how people relate now. These pieces of underwear are people. The person who wrote the personal ad is shopping for and buying different people," Hiro said. For each piece, Hiro used real underwear to create her whimsical bundles of clay.

CHRISTINE RYAN / contributing photographer "Notes Beyond the Trees," a piece by graduate student Julie Singer, is on display at the Graduate Student Show in Zirkle House. The exhibit features a variety a works as each artist expresses his or her own personal theme.

Aside from presenting with the other graduate students in Zirkle House, Cyndi Gusler presents her thesis work in the Sawhill Gallery in Duke Hall. This work is the culmination of her graduate study, epitomized by Jean Baudrillard in her thesis epigraph, "Is not the fact that the glass packaging can be thrown away the mark of the Golden Age?"

Her show, loosely titled "The Essence of Glass Packaging," is inspired by her strong relationship with nature. She incorporates post-consumer, non-recyclable trash into her artwork.

Given her inclination toward landscape pieces, the trash is used ironically. "I see an aesthetic quality to what people would throw away," Gusler said.
This aesthetic quality is seen in her piece, "Yellow." This mixed media of gold beads, mustard packaging, yellow spoons and so on, hangs on yellow string from the ceiling. She created this work at a time when she was depressed from the long grayness of winter. "While walking, I saw this Ginko tree dropping cadmium yellow leaves, and my mood changed. There was an essence I wanted to capture — the lightness of the piece reflected the lightness of my mood," Gusler said.

She said her favorite piece is an untitled work constructed on faux leather, zippers and broken-off pieces of hair clips. "Untitled" is mounted on a wall, where it curves in a gentle "s" shape. The mixed elements are layered to follow an upward grain, leading the viewer's eye up over its sloping hills and dales. It is meant to evoke a purely aesthetic response out of its textural depth, according to Gusler. "It gets the visceral senses going," Gusler said. Gusler's display at Sawhill Gallery runs through Dec. 1.

The exhibit runs through Dec. 7. Zirkle House galleries are open Monday through Thursday from noon to 5 p.m., Friday and Saturday from noon to 4 p.m. and are closed on Sunday. Sawhill Gallery is open Monday through Friday from 10:30 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. and Saturday and Sunday from 1:30 p.m. to 4:30 p.m.