Homecoming: UW Art MFA Class of 2020 Reunion Exhibition
September 24 - October 15
Closing Reception: Friday, October 15 @ 5 - 8pm

Location: Art Lofts, 111 N Frances St, Madison, WI

Artists: Yoshinori Asai, Noël Ash, Autumn Brown, Anwar Floyd-Pruitt, Abrahm Guthrie-Potter, Max Hautala, Kyle Herrera, Derek Hibbs, Maryam Ladoni, Ashley Lusietto, Kel Mur, Guzzo Pinc, Lucas Pointon, Solarpunk Surf Club, Cate Richards, Jodi Robertson, Pranav Sood, and Kayla Story

Homecoming reunites the MFA Class of 2020 over a year after their time at UW was cut short. The artists have gone on to make the most of their first year out of the program despite the circumstances and are returning now to celebrate. The exhibition brings together video, painting, photography, sculpture, and more into one space.

Call for Entries: UW-Madison Juried Alumni Exhibition at SGCI 2022 Annual Conference: Madison Our Shared Future
Deadline: November 1

The University of Wisconsin-Madison Printmaking Area of the Art Department invites UW-Madison alumni to submit printmaking artworks to be considered for Spring 2022 alumni exhibitions at the UW-Madison Union Art Galleries during the Southern Graphics Council International Annual Conference in Madison, Wisconsin, March 16-19, 2022. Guest curated by Tyanna J. Buie, Assistant Professor, Section Chair of Printmaking at the College of Creative Studies in Detroit, and a UW-Madison alumna.

Dance Like You Mean Design Artist Talk and Workshop by Bernard Canniffe
Tuesday and Thursday, October 5 and 7 @ 11:30-1:30pm
ART 448: Spacial Graphic Design
Humanities Building Room 6441, 6th Floor
455 N Park St
University of Wisconsin-Madison

Dance Like You Mean Design is a two-day community-based, participatory and immersive workshop led by Iowa State University Professor of Graphic Design and co-founder of PIECE Studio, Bernard J. Canniffe.

If you have questioned the power and relevance of design, and how that relates to a world that is both more interconnected and paradoxically more fragmented, this workshop is for you. Join Canniffe and a group of your peers for a two-day experience where you will flex your creative skills, use design as a catalyst for positive change, think about design differently and consider how your skills can give back to a community.

Participants will practice a series of transformative group exercises and challenge preconceive notions of design. You will come to terms with the possibilities of design whether sitting at the grown-up’s table for the first time or grown up and facing important global challenges. This workshop will give you the skills to understand what it takes to engage in and with communities as well as developing groundbreaking real community projects.

Bernard J. Canniffe has published work in Graphis Design Annual, How magazine, STEP Design Magazine, GOOD Magazine, PRINT Design magazine, and CCPH Perspectives to name but a few. He is the recipient of the Graphis Designers for the New Millennium, 2000 Award, the Joseph Binder Award and is the recipient of two SAPPI Ideas That Matter awards. He co-founded the collaborative social design PIECE STUDIO in 2008 and is an advisor to the international social collaborative Project M. Three of his posters were included in the Beijing Poster Biennale and his work was included in This is for Real: War and the Contemporary Audience exhibition at Stoney Brook University. He was one of a few international artists invited to exhibit at the Museum of Art at the Newton Center for British-American Studies.

Canniffe's ideas about Nomadic Design, Blue Collar Design Theory, PIECE Studio and social justice design have been widely published and cited. He has presented on the interconnections between design, social justice, entrepreneurship and innovation at Cumulus Design Conferences, the National Institute of Design, Ahmedabad, India, at Willem de Kooning Académie in Rotterdam, Lees McRae College in North Carolina, Zayed University, Dubai, Osaka, Japan, Seoul, South Korea and at the P&D Design Conference in Sao Paulo, Brazil, and his work has been archived in the Library of Congress.

Canniffe is originally from Merthyr Tydfil, South Wales, has lived in the United States since 1991. He holds a BA (Hons) in graphic design from the Newport College of Art & Design, University of Wales, and an MFA from the Savannah College of Art and Design.

Calling UW-Madison Student Artists + Activists

The University of Wisconsin–Madison Division of the Arts believes the arts are a vital resource. They are a means to express outrage against social and political injustices; to imagine and build more inclusive futures through community practice. The arts promote understanding, joy, and appreciation for the plural identities present in our communities. They are functional tools for artists and audiences to address issues of inequity and articulate the need for social change.

UW-Madison students have the talent, creativity, and ability to imagine timely responses to significant community challenges, especially through the arts. Students can use the arts to create change through action. That’s why the Division of the Arts is pleased to offer a new Artivism Student Action Program (ASAP) Fund in the fall of 2021! The grant will facilitate student-led endeavors demonstrating strong intersections of art and activism. In turn, our communities will move closer to the vision for equity and inclusivity that we hold as a campus.

2021 Master of Fine Arts Exhibitions

Artists: Rita Mawuena Benissan, Paul Bulgin, Jonathan Byxbe, Jeff Chelf, Conley Clark, Eva Gabriella Flynn, Eric Hazeltine, Jamie Jacobson, Maeve Leslie, Roberto Torres Mata, Taj Matumbi, Ziqin (Marsh) Min, Anders Nienstaedt, Lesley Anne Numbers, Bill Rice, Hannah Schleb, Matthew Vivirito, Oudi Wan, and Mae Wilson

Location: Online

During the Spring 2021 semester, campus access restrictions prevented us from opening our galleries to the public. Here’s your chance to see many of the University of Wisconsin-Madison Art Department Class of 2021 Master of Fine Arts Exhibitions!

The MFA Exhibitions mark the culmination of a three-year degree program that emphasizes development of a rigorous studio art practice under the supervision of a faculty guidance committee. Exploring an inter-disciplinary approach to art making, as well as course work in art history and related fields, artists cultivate professional practices that facilitates a sustainable career in the arts.

Join us in celebrating our Class of 2021 UW-Madison Graduate professionals!

2021 Bachelor of Fine Arts Senior Exhibition

Artists: Rachel Carboni, Jocelyn Chan, Nicholas Christensen, Carla Christenson, Meghan Draheim, Madison Eliza, Paulina Eguino, Emma Leeper, Craig Jun Li, Hedi Ma, Kennedy McCarthy, Noah Laroia-Nguyen, Lexie Olson, Melissa Paterson, Bre'Annah Stampley, Juan Antonio Torres, Brittany Waldinger, Margaret Cannon Walker, and Chris Zak

Location: Online

The annual University of Wisconsin-Madison Art Department Bachelor of Fine Arts Senior Exhibition presents the refined art portfolios of our new Class of 2021 cohort of BFA graduates and experts in creative problem solving, visual communication, teamwork and collaboration, and project management!

Requiring a number of studio and aesthetic courses in preparation for their careers as professional artists and/or for graduate study, the BFA program provides students the opportunity to specialize in areas such as ceramics, drawing, glass and neon, graphic design, papermaking, performance, photography, and more, harnessing and nurturing their creative energies to develop the critical and artistic skills needed to excel in contemporary multidisciplinary practices leading to influential and rewarding careers in art and design.

BLOOM Spring 2021: Graphic Design Area Exhibition

Location: Online

Basic Graphic Design: Annabelle Zhang, Honey Herr, and Melissa Ziegler

Coding for Graphic Design: Maria Rantis, Anjika Verma, Courtney Goodkin, Josephine Cutrara, N. Kittivatcharapong, and Aileen Lee

Graphic Design for Branding and Identity: Madeleine Freitag, Nicole Golownia, Travis Dao, Holly Gunnink, Sebastian Karo, and Austin Wallenfang

Information Graphics: Madeleine Freitag, Ellie Eisenberg, Hamilton Smith, Savannah Byers, Ashley Harris, Annika Ide, and Laura Kohlnhofer

Graphic Design for Packaging: Rachel Betters, Jessalyn Mailoa, Kaylene Yong, Emily Her, Nicole Golownia, Tracy Fu, and Yijie Li

Typeface Design: Austin Wallenfang, Emma Leeper, Jessalyn Mailoa, Koby Batholomew, and Nicole Golownia

Graphic Design for Posters: Hannah Klintworth, Jessalyn Mailoa, Macxkenzie Dow, Elizabteh Jortberg, Sophia Bellora, Celeste Carroll, and Hedi Ma

Graphic Design Senior Thesis: Tracy Fu, Yijie Li, and Jessalyn Mailoa

Graphic Design for Interactive Media: Kaylene Yong, Kristen Koenig, Jessalyn Mailoa, and Maria Rantis

Portfolio Development and Professional Practice: Eury Kim, Jessalyn Mailoa, Maria Rantis, and Kaylene Yong

The Graphic Design Area in the Art Department at the University of Wisconsin–Madison offers 19 courses in wide range of sub-disciplines. The work included in this online exhibition is among the best that our students produced during a very challenging year. The faculty appreciate and respect the effort they put into these projects.

In no.5: Elegy: For Spinoza by Professor of Art Metal Lisa Gralnick
September 17 - October 31

Opening Reception: Friday, September 17, 5-9pm

Virtual Artist Talk: Thursday, September 30, 5pm CDT

Location: Abel Contemporary Gallery and online, 524 E Main Street, Stoughton, WI

Esteemed artist and professor of Art Metals at UW Madison, Lisa Gralnick’s illustrious four-decade career is decorated with numerous prestigious exhibitions, fellowships, grants, and awards; most recently, she was recognized by the American Craft Council as a 2020 College of Fellows Honoree. Gralnick is a true master of her craft, known for her thought-provoking work both that engages conceptually with and transcends material value and the history of art.

This body of work, which address the history of Dutch Still-Life Painting, was produced at the European Ceramic Workcentre in the Netherlands, an artist-in-residence center whose aim is to promote the development of ceramic art, design, and architecture. Baruch Spinoza was a Dutch Jewish philosopher of the 16th Century Dutch Golden Age. His work was concurrent with the great era of Dutch still life painting and he is considered one of the great rationalist thinkers who investigated questions of ethics. Interestingly, the period in art that we call the Dutch Golden Age that produced remarkable vanitas paintings of ostentatious and abundant tables with toppling platters of lobster and fruit and cheeses was also the period in which Calvinism took hold in the Netherlands-- a tradition of frugality, modesty, restraint, and austerity that still permeates contemporary Dutch culture. These diminutive 16th C vanitas paintings, with all their elaborate and sensual renderings have a darkness at their core that suggests the hollowness of earthly delights and the brevity of life. For Gralnick, it’s an interesting meditation on the human condition.

Jack Damer: Prints, Drawings & Objects 1965-2021
September 10 - October 31

Gallery talk with Jack Damer: Saturday, October 9, 2-3pm

Location: James Watrous Gallery, Overture Center for the Arts, 3rd Floor, 201 State Street, Madison, WI

A retrospective exhibit of the work of Emeritus Professor Jack Damer: master printmaker, brilliant draftsman, and influential teacher. Damer’s prolific output ranges from densely layered images of engines and machine parts to poignant drawings of found objects and elaborate constructions made from his own prints. The cool, industrial look of Damer’s source material is transformed through his sensitive line, subtle use of tone and color and, often, a mordant humor that borders on moral outrage.

Join us for an informal hour in the gallery with Jack Damer, who will share insights about his work, his innovative printmaking techniques, and his approach to teaching. We'll have plenty of time for questions.