Michigan art exhibition showcases Bobcat talent
OU Redux: Forty Years Down the Road features the artwork of nearly two dozen Ohio University alumni.
Grace Koennecke, BSJ ’25 | August 8, 2024
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Art, with its many different mediums, allows not only for creative expression but also a chance to connect with other artists and build community. To that end, Judith Racht Gallery in Harbert, Michigan, is honoring the work of 20 Bobcats in an exhibition titled OU Redux: Forty Years Down the Road .
Pete Maloy, BFA ’86, is a commercial photographer, adjunct professor at Columbia College Chicago and one of the artists involved in the exhibition. He says the process of bringing it together came from a desire to show his students the importance of creating a tight-knit art community, like the one he had while in Athens.
“Spring garden teapot” by Christy Knox, MFA ’86, ceramic pot. Knox majored in ceramics and has been a full-time potter for 40 years, taught workshops across the country and been published in two books on ceramics.
“Hitch(ed)” by Allyson McDuffie, BFA ’86, MFA ’88, archival pigment print. McDuffie majored in studio art and printmaking and now primarily works in printmaking, drawing, painting, mixed media, photography and digital drawing. She co-owns Kin Gallery and Studio with her wife in Boulder, Colorado.
“Beverly and Kathleen” from the "Data Dump" series by Brian Benedict, MFA ’84, photography. Benedict majored in photography and in the last 20-plus years has worked for Eastman Kodak Co. and Fujifilm USA. Now semi-retired, he continues to produce images and commercial graphic design.
Untitled work by Calvin S. Moore, MFA ’85, gouache collage on paper. Moore majored in printmaking; today he lives in a Chicago suburb works primarily in drawing, sculpture and printmaking.
“The Flight” by Mark DeBernardi, BFA ’88, photography. Debernardi majored in photography and is currently a mixed media artist and art educator based in Evanston, Illinois.
“Clark Fork Haunting” by Curt Walters, MFA ’85, mixed media on canvas. Walters majored in photography and currently resides in Arizona, where he creates art inspired by his surroundings using debris found in the desert and paper pulped from junk mail.
Two years ago, Maloy joined forces with Bill Zuehlke, MFA ’86, who works for Judith Racht Gallery and has shown his art there several times, and Racht herself to start building the exhibition. Maloy and Zuehlke originally planned to include just three fellow alumni in the project, but that number unexpectedly expanded after word-of-mouth trickled down about the gallery, demonstrating the undeniable Bobcat spirit that the University leaves on those who attend.
“Separation” by Mark Hackworth, MFA ’84, intaglio print. Hackworth majored in printmaking and painting and has since explored other mediums, including printmaking, painting, drawing and photography. He currently owns and operates Pigeon Coop Press, a collaborative printmaking studio in Athens.
“Cooling Tower Zimmer Power Plant, Moscow, Ohio” by Chuck Heiney, MFA ’89, photography. For more than 30 years, Heiney has operated Chuck Heiney Photography; he is also an adjunct professor at Grand Rapids Community College in Michigan, where he resides.
“Under the Dock, Provincetown” by Paul Teeling, BFA ’86, photography. After studying photography at OHIO, Teeling branched into mixed media while retaining a focus on digital and film photography. He co-owns Telos Gallery in Greenfield, Massachusetts.
Piece from “Far End of the Spectrum” series by Bill Zuehlke, MFA ’86, acrylic on canvas. Zuehlke majored in painting and now works in mixed media and metalwork sculpture; he is based in Niles, Michigan.
“Idol Remnants 1E” by Pete Maloy, BFA ’86, giclée print on canvas. Maloy used his photography degree from OHIO to make a career in commercial photography; he also has taught photography at Columbia College Chicago for nearly 20 years. His art now focuses on digital collage.
Piece from “Plein Air Landscape” series by E. Charles Rolwing III, MFA ’86, oil on canvas. Rolwing majored in photography and now is a Chicago-based painter with a focus on symbolism and embodied motion.
Maloy says he’s looking forward to reuniting with his classmates from across the country and exploring each artist’s work during the exhibition. He also hopes the presenting artists come to the exhibition to find new perspectives.
“I teach at Columbia College, which is in the South Loop in Chicago, and that's a very, very different college experience than Athens, Ohio, in the foothills of the Appalachians on the Ohio River,” Maloy says. “I try to explore with my students, sometimes, what kind of community, what kind of commitment do they all have? Do they have what we had? It's hard for me to gauge and to see it, and I’d love for artists to come and see that [and] develop their own.”
“Portable Forest-walking box” by Kirsten L. fisherPrice, BFA ’91, mixed media. fisherPrice majored in studio art; her mixed media objects and works on paper employ some encaustic and furniture finishing techniques. Her studio is currently in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania.
“Fired Cone 6” by Margaret M. Hutzel, BFA ’87, ceramic jar. Hutzel majored in ceramics and is a part-time studio potter in Athens. She also serves as co-leader of an applied research team with OHIO’s Voinovich School of Leadership and Public Service.
“Golim” by Raymond Bugelski, MFA ’84, acrylic on MDF. Bugelski majored in photography and currently works with at Majestic Steel USA in Cleveland, Ohio. His mixed media works reconfigure found objects into intricately constructed wall sculptures.
“King of the Village” by Patty Mitchell, BFA ’87, MFA ’91, photography. Mitchell majored in photography and is an artist and social entrepreneur specializing in collaboration between artists with and without developmental differences. She is the founder and executive director at Passion Works Studio in Athens.
“Quilt Series: 5 Panes” by Susan Griswold, BFA ’87, metalwork sculpture. Griswold majored in ceramics and is now a freelance art handler, rigger and welder in Portland, Oregon, operating under the name St Johns Sculpture.
“Oculus NY” by Thomas Lanham, MFA ’85, photography. Lanham majored in photography and today is a museum project registrar based in Columbus, Georgia.
“Keeboom” by Terrance Wharton, etching on paper. The lone non-alumnus in the exhibition was a dear friend of Pete Maloy’s until Wharton’s death in 2021. “I just couldn’t do the show without a piece of his,” Maloy says. This piece “is a perfect representation of Terry and our time at OU. It was an appropriation from the men’s second-floor bathroom stall [in] Seigfred Hall … circa 1983.”
“422 weeks-2016 workdays-8.11 years” by Tony Sutowski, MFA ’87, collected object sculpture. Sutowski majored in sculpture at OHIO and now has extensive experience with foundry metals. Based in Iowa City, Iowa, he works in various mediums; for this exhibit, he constructed towers made of disposable coffee cup lids.
OU Redux: Forty Years Down the Road opened July 27 and will run until Aug. 17. Judith Racht Gallery is open from 6 to 8 p.m. daily.