Vanessa Albury | A. Bills-Levi | Gayle Brooker | Lisa Chou | Margaret Clarke | T. Davidson | Steven Davis | John Duckworth | Meghan Henley | Krist Mills | Sue Murray | Dorothy Netherlands | Rachel O’Neal | Larissa Patel | Lynn Patterson | Matt Smithson | Jonathan Walsh

To create an exhibit drawn from works by Studio Art graduates may seem to be a daunting task; faced with so many choices, the result could become merely arbitrary or too disparate to cohere as an exhibition. But in fact, my experience was quite the contrary. All artists have at least one thing in common—they all have influences. And for all of these artists, one of their most influential experiences was the time they spent as Studio Art students at the College of Charleston.

In this exhibit, I see the influences as well as the individual accomplishments of artists who studied here at the College. Whether faintly or pronounced, the impressions of their Studio Art professors resonate in these works. The goal, however, of myself and Dr. Marian Mazzone was to choose a select group of Studio Art alumni whose works have continued to develop, becoming their own unique creations and contributions. By limiting the selection to Studio Art graduates of the past ten years, we were able to look at the work of artists who are still developing their sense of “self” in the art world, while also still having some identity with the College.

I grew up in Atlanta and moved to Charleston in 1993 to attend the College of Charleston. I received B.A. degrees in English, Art History, and Studio Art in 1998. After graduation, I went traveling for five months camping my way across the US– which later inspired me to relocate to the west coast. I have worked for various creative and art organizations since graduating: as the Administrative Assistant for the Studio Art Department at the College of Charleston, as a Security Guard for the Seattle Art Museum, as an administrator at a non-profit organization for artists with disabilities, VSA arts of Washington, and most recently at a school for highly capable and talented children, Seattle Country Day School. Since moving to Seattle, I have been involved in three collaborative art exhibits with my security guard cohorts known as Live Nude Goats, and most recently participated in a mural project for the City of Seattle at the University of Washington.