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| | Selections from Thesis Projects in the MFA Illustration as Visual Essay Department
April 30 - May 15, 2010
Reception: Tuesday, May 4, 6-8pm
School of Visual Arts (SVA) presents “Selections from Thesis Projects in
the MFA Illustration as Visual Essay Department,” an exhibition that
brings together books, figurative paintings, comic books and narrative
series by 19 students graduating from the MFA Illustration as Visual Essay Department. The exhibition is curated by faculty member David Sandlin.
Using egg tempura on gesso panels, Emma Augylius created a series of portraits of children’s faces, balancing idealized beauty with a slight awkwardness and a sense of distance. Augylius’ thesis advisor is faculty member Peter McCarty.
Matt Barteluce’s children’s book The Rubber Duck Chronicles: It’s a Wide, Weird World is the first volume of a series highlighting the maritime adventures of a duck named Pip, his brother Squeak and their dozens and dozens of cousins. Inspired by the true story of a container of rubber ducks that was lost at sea and tracked by oceanographers over the course of two decades, this series introduces ocean life to children. It is mixture of text and images, with ink, watercolor and digital color. Barteluce’s thesis advisor is faculty member Mirko Ilic.
Jonathan Bartlett says of his thesis project, “This series of work is not a series. The images should be read individually, as different stories within themselves. However, the shared principles which hold them all together are the sense of mystery and emotion and the use of metaphor. As a result, the work relates as a cohesive body of illustrations with one collective voice.” Bartlett’s thesis advisor is faculty member Yuko Shimizu.
Wes Benson created a series of oil paintings inspired by recent photographs he has taken, primarily of locations in New York City and Coney Island. Benson’s thesis advisor is faculty member Tomer Hanuka.
Kristy Caldwell’s children’s book The Wrong Color is the story of a happily self-absorbed boy named Warden who takes personal offense at the arrival of a new piece of furniture in his house. He focuses on its most irritating feature - the color - and takes out his aggression on all other objects in the house of that color. Ink, markers and digital color create the atmosphere of this 40-page picture book. Caldwell’s thesis advisor is faculty member Rachael Cole.
Created using black-and-white brush and ink drawings, Siyu Chen’s comic book Alice in Wonder City is an adaption of Lewis Carroll's classic book Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland. In Chen’s version, Alice is a Chinese girl who follows a rabbit-headed man to Wonder City, New York. She meets the characters from the original story - the Cheshire Cat, the Mad Hatter, the Queen of Hearts - who all reside in iconic parts of New York City. Chen’s thesis advisor is faculty member Paul Buckley.
Christopher Darling created a graphic diary based on Nick Pope, a script written by L.A.-based screenwriter Christopher Stanton. The diary chronicles the everyday life of an awkward sophomore in high school in 1987. Ridiculed for the large birthmarks on his face, Nick takes refuge in his diary, where he chronicles his insecurities, his search for sexual identity and his occasional struggle with depression. Darling’s thesis advisor is faculty member David Healtey.
Using nib pen, ink, watercolor and the computer, Anne Emond created an illustrated novel about a girl named Frances who spends much of her time alone telling stories to herself. Frances is visited by the ghost of her mother’s childhood idol, an actor from detective movies named Bay Callahan who takes her on a bizarre journey. Emond’s thesis advisor is faculty member Lauren Redniss.
Anat Even-Or’s comic book Wandering on tells the stories of five different dreams. Each story shows a different dreamer and is executed in a slightly different comics format. Even-Or’s thesis advisor is faculty member Jillian Tamaki.
Sarah Knotz children’s book The Sick Day tells the story of Sophia, who, while passing idle hours in her bed, imagines the changing colors of light transporting her to environments far outside of the walls of her room. The images in the book are made in Photoshop from scanned pastel drawings. Knotz’s thesis advisor is faculty member Christopher Silas Neal.
Thomas Knowler’s animation explores the relationship between inspiration and urbanization. All line work in the animation was hand-drawn with pencil, then scanned and colored digitally. Knowler’s thesis advisor is faculty member Bill Plympton.
J. P. Peer created a series of paintings about an island inhabited by monks and soldiers. As resources on the island are depleted after years of wasteful living by the soldiers, the two groups are forced to confront one another. Peer’s thesis advisor is faculty member Natalie Ascencios.
Inspired by California “ghost towns” that the artist has visited, Laura Peyton created her illustrated book Elizabeth Clarke’s Forgotten Town. The book weaves together the stories of a girl growing up in a 19th-century Gold Rush town and a modern-day boy who travels to the same town and discovers her ghost. All the paintings are mixed media on board. Peyton’s thesis advisor is faculty member Teresa Fasolino.
Using a variety of techniques including painting with gouache, drawing with pen and ink, watercolor and digital coloring, Andrew Roberts created a series of cover illustrations for The New Yorker. The images focus on issues related to both New York City and the nation as a whole, including the expanding presence of bicyclists on New York streets, the health care debate and global warming. Roberts thesis advisor is faculty member Edel Rodriguez.
Clay Rodery’s series of drawings takes on the perspective of Dororthy Gale from Frank L. Baum’s The Wizard of Oz as she documents her adventures in Oz. Rodery’s thesis advisor is faculty member Matthew Richmond.
Using oil on paper and wood panels, Kelley Hensing created a series of portraits of carnivalesque characters, which suggest how humans interact with nature in what the artist considers its wild, harnessed and corrupted forms. Hensing’s thesis advisor is faculty member Donato Giancola.
The exhibition also includes work by Nathan Bulmer, whose thesis advisor is Mark Newgarden; Jeffrey Dalessandro, whose thesis advisor is Carl Titolo; and Brendan Leach whose thesis advisor is David Mazzucchelli.
The MFA in Illustration as Visual Essay is designed to maximize students’ opportunities as figurative artists, from the conventional gallery wall to the full range of 21st-century media. The program fuses the development of creative thinking with technical and communication skills. Additional focus is placed on best practices in navigating the visual art marketplace while empowering students to choose making art as a way of life.
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| | Visual Arts Gallery
601 West 26 Street, 15th floor
New York,
NY 10001
212.592.2145
The Visual Arts Gallery is SVA's premier exhibition facility. Located in Chelsea on the 15th floor of the landmark Starrett-Lehigh Building, it comprises four state of the art galleries and a large terrace with a commanding view of Lower Manhattan and the Hudson River. Staffed by six full-time professionals, Visual Arts Gallery offers select students the opportunity to exhibit and sell their work in the same environment as some of the country's leading artists--a number of whom have exhibited there as well.
Since the Visual Arts Gallery moved from 137 Wooster Street in Soho to its present location in 2004, it has exhibited works by renowned SVA alumni such as Renee Cox, Inka Essenhigh, Joseph Kosuth, Robert Lazzarini, Sol Lewitt, Vera Lutter, Elizabeth Peyton, Alexis Rockman, Collier Schorr, Lorna Simpson and Sara Sze, Works by Richard Avedon, Milton Glaser, Anish Kapoor, Stefan Sagmeister, Sebastiao Salgado have also been exhibited at the Visual Arts Gallery.
SVA students of every discipline derive great educational benefit from being able to study the work of celebrated artists, hear them speak at lectures, or even get the chance to meet them in person -- all right here at the College.
The Visual Arts Gallery is open Monday through Saturday 10 a.m. to 6 p.m., and is closed Sunday and federal holidays*. The gallery is accessible by wheelchair. For more information, or to purchase student's work (the gallery takes no commission), please call 212.592.2145.
*Summer Hours: The gallery will be closed for the
Independence Day holiday weekend from Friday, July 2, 1pm through
Monday, July 5. June 4th
through August 20th, 2010, the gallery will be closing one hour earlier
on Fridays (5pm instead of 6pm).
For press inquiries, please call the Office of Communication at 212.592.2010 or email proffice@sva.edu
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