Still Life of Men - Brenda Gilliam
January 10 - February 15, 2025
Opening Reception: January 17| 6:30-8:30 pm
Curated Gallery
Over the years Brenda Gilliam has collected thousands of images to use as inspiration for future paintings, grouped by subject matter. These images are comprised of her photos and sketches, images from friends and family, clippings from print material and most recently social media.
The choice of subject matter was not so much about the man as emphasis, but the man as representative of humanity - what we do, how we feel, how we live day-to-day presented in Gilliam’s signature style.
Chaotic and Harmonious - Ladan Bahmani and Brian Patrick Franklin
April 18 - May 24, 2025
Curated Gallery
Opening Reception: April 18 | 6:30-8:00 pm
Chaotic and Harmonious, an exhibition of the collaborative work of Ladan Bahmani and Brian Patrick Franklin, contemplates the role of repetition in mass communication and its influence on the creation and destruction of meaning. Abstract text and short fiction work together to present a narrative leading through the entire mixed-media installation, as patterns and imagery borrowed from illuminated manuscripts in the artists’ Persian and Irish backgrounds instill the language with a weight of meaning, reverence, and authority intrinsic to those historical books.
Over the course of each paragraph, recognizable letterforms rise and fall from fields of noise to create short phrases just barely decipherable. As the text oscillates between being legible and being illegible, words continually appear, break down, dissolve, and transform into new phrases. Each message stands alone in its ambiguous intent, while at the same time, connecting with the phrases in neighboring works. As viewers move from one composition to another, the phrases they uncover string together to form a unique poetry of their path and point toward the collective power in language and meaning. While the disruptions in each letterform disconnect us from the language that we are familiar with, the repeated structure of the text provides just enough clues to encourage the reader to decode each now-abstract phrase.
‘living- language- land’ Inspired
April 18 - May 24, 2025
Ramp Gallery
Opening Reception: April 18 | 6:30-8:00 pm
SAQA KS-MO-OK Regional members (primary and secondary) were asked to select at least one word and create one or more art quilts inspired by that word based on their research and creative voice. Works were limited to a dimension combination of 12” and/or 24”, either 2D or 3D. Many people signed up for multiple words. In the end, we collected at least two art quilts per each of the 26 words, resulting in a total of 54 artworks. A total of 20 artists from 7 different states participated.
FREAK SHOW Mixed Media and Drawings by William H. Thielen
June 13 - July 19, 2025
Opening Reception: June 13, 6:30-8pm
Gallery Talk: June 13, 6-6:30
Curated Gallery
The issues behind my work are personal and autobiographical. I work with them because they are an attempt to find my own true identity in a divisive social structure. Abstraction allows me the greatest possibility of encapsulating the emotional intensity surrounding my subject matter. Over the years I have come to realize that emotions can be best portrayed with the use of two simple things: color and materials. These items can best describe the dilemmas that consume my life. Black and white must be there. Even though the world is filled with shades of gray, society moves us toward the extremes. You’re either for or against something; there is no room for compromise; you must be all-in; agree with me or you’re a traitor. Color is entirely about emotions. They are something we all have, yet many people avoid them. We are told not to trust them; they make you weak if you show or act on them. The are truly an abstract concept which so many fear, which is why they hold so much power. The materials I use are by choice; they hold a second class position in the art world. This helps to reinforce/elevate the overall statement of the piece. These works are about extremes and the tension that is created when opposites are thrust together. The opposites may conflict, but need each other to define each other. These pieces are about looking for emotional truth in a post-modern world.
Agora by Jade Nguyẽn
June 13 - July 19, 2025
Opening Reception: June 13, 6:30-8pm
Gallery Talk: June 13, 6-6:30
Ramp Gallery
Agora is a documentary series that explores traditional Vietnamese marketplaces, examining how these spaces reflect Vietnamese life through the desires, needs, interconnectivity, and humanity of its people. The market exists as a place to foster connection, a celebration of community, and a microcosm for the multilayered flavors of Vietnamese culture. The instantaneous nature of photography captures fleeting pockets of life that burst through narrow sidewalks and makeshift stalls of sumptuous goods, crinkled money, and passing shadows in dynamic compositions and vibrant colors. From amiable chatters to growling motorbikes, different tones of human activity form a cacophony of the streets, where the chaos becomes familiar and strangers become kin.
Making History - Threads of Time 1925-2025 presented by the Weaver’s Guild of St. Louis
June 13 - July 19, 2025
Opening Reception: June 6, 6:30-8pm
Juried Gallery
The Weavers' Guild is proud to be the second oldest weaver’s guild in the United States. Currently celebrating their 100th anniversary, the guild's history began when weaving classes were added to the School of Fine Arts at Washington University in 1917 by Director Edmund Wuerpel and students joined together to officially create the Weavers’ Guild of St. Louis in 1925/26. This active group of contemporary textile artists ranges from fiber enthusiasts to novice weavers as well as professional production weavers. Today, the Weavers' Guild of St. Louis has grown to nearly 300 members and is proud of the legacy left by our talented weavers and fiber artists over the decades.