Art students are making a splash with their final exhibition of the semester.
"Splash," a juried art show, is at UNM Art Museum's lower gallery through May 4.
It features works by artists in UNM's MFA graduate art program.
Three of the artists were given special awards for their pieces. Jenna Kuiper won the Florence Henri Prize, Craig Donalson won the Friends of Art Prize, and May Goldman Chaltiel won the Ana Mendieta Prize.
One of the artists literally took a dive into her art.
Chaltiel's video projection, "Breathe," shows black-and-white images of her swimming in green water. Viewers can watch and listen through accompanying headphones and experience Chaltiel's slow, steady breath and movement as she cuts through the water.
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"I gave myself superhuman attributes, but I wanted to bring the viewer into the water with me," she said. "It's a moment of escape, basically."
The show was juried by Suzanne Sbarge, executive director of 516 Arts. She said she was inspired to name the show "Splash" by Chaltiel's piece.
"The figure diving into the water was the inspiration for the title," she said. "I intended it to show the depth and breadth of the work coming out of the graduate art program."
Sbarge said she chose pieces for the show that could hold their own outside of the academic realm.
"I chose works I thought would hold up in the larger art world - that I could imagine seeing in galleries, museums and in other contexts," she said.
Kuiper received the Florence Henri Prize for her two oil paintings "Pier" and "Lister," also set around water. Both pieces feature similar scenes where dark blue water stretches a vast distance to meet a blue-gray sky. The locations and times of day are ambiguous, and the paintings engender feelings of both serenity and desolation.
"I was interested in the sense of place that I felt that these two paintings showed," Kuiper said. "I chose pieces that had a charged air."
Kuiper said she tried to simplify shapes as much as she could while keeping the feeling ambiguous.
"I was interested in disclosure and in allowing room for questions without saying too much," she said.
Donalson's piece, "Kindling: Artifact of Process," features four adjacent stacks of layered, crisscrossing sticks that form a larger square. At first glance, they look like pieces of kindling because of their intricate woodgrain texture, but a closer look reveals they are actually made from clay.
Donalson wanted this piece to be different.
"I wanted to memorialize the wood by not burning it," said Donalson, who got his BFA at Northern Arizona University, a school internationally recognized for its wood firing.
Sbarge said she tried to give the show an expansive view by including sculpture, paint, found objects and video projections.
"Splash" encourages viewers to escape their hectic lives for a moment, to look for a deeper reflection into unfamiliar waters. Like Donalson's "Artifact of Process," they teach to not take a first glance for granted, but to look twice to see something for what it really is.
Sbarge was pleased with the work submitted in the show.
"I was overall very impressed with the high level of work the program is producing," she said.
"Splash"
UNM Art Museum lower gallery
Through May 4
Free
