Southern Utah University’s Department of Filmmaking, Art, and Design has teamed up with the Southern Utah Museum of Art once again to showcase the 2024 Senior Bachelor of Fine Arts Exhibition. The exhibit, “Incandescent”, opened on March 18 and will run until April 26.
An opening reception for the exhibition took place on March 26 from 7 p.m. to 9 p.m. Students and community members were invited to celebrate the graduating class as seniors displayed a range of work, including graphic design, illustration, painting and more.
Jack Powell, a graphic design major, had a magazine based around mental health showcased at the exhibition.
“I Was Here” is a collection of texts curated from Powell’s notes app on his phone from the past two and a half years paired with a collection of art he created throughout the school year.
“I struggled a lot with mental health before I got to college, and then I also struggled with it throughout college. The place I turned to was my notes app,” explained Powell. “I just wrote down little things that came to my head.”
Powell feels that his experience at SUU has been very positive, and he wants his project to be a sign of hope for those that may need it.
“I really wanted to open that door and show that if I could make it, then other people could make it, too,” said Powell.
Zoë Petersen, an illustration major, also feels the same way about her time spent attending SUU.
“You really get to know everybody, and you know the professors,” said Petersen. “There’s a lot of great mentors in the department that have helped me learn more about the specific things I’m interested in.”
One of the specific things that Petersen was interested in learning more about was picture books. For her project, she created an illustrated book titled “Ruth Went Out.” The book focuses on themes of mindfulness and noticing beauty in the world around you.
“It’s about a girl who goes on a walk through her neighborhood,” explained Petersen. “She takes [the walk] really slow: she looks closely at things, she picks things up, she drops them, and she plays on her way. It’s a wordless picture book, so the reader is going along on this walk with the character.”
These projects and others can be viewed by the public for free Monday through Saturday from 10 a.m. to 6 p.m.
For more information on “Incandescent,” you can visit the exhibition website. To learn more about SUMA or to view any other upcoming exhibitions, visit http://www.suu.edu/suma.
Author: Gentry Wolf
Photographer: Gentry Wolf
Editor: Tessa Cheshire
arts@suunews.net
