Santa Rosa Junior College art students have created a gallery exhibit featuring works by their instructors, which is on display in the Robert F. Agrella Gallery in Doyle Library from Feb. 18 to April 4.
The exhibit displays pieces in a wide variety of mediums, from oil and watercolor to ceramic and metal. For anyone interested in taking an art class, it serves as an example of the skills SRJC instructors have to impart.
Jessie Basham, a former student said, “You get to see what your teachers can do, and what you can learn in their classes.”
The gallery serves a purpose beyond displaying art. As part of the coursework for the exhibition design and management class, students are given valuable experience in displaying art, according to the class’s instructor and gallery director, Christopher Woodcock.
“It teaches students how to hang artwork, sequencing, creating some type of story to move people through a space. It’s a special thing to be able to do with the students,” Woodcock said.
Woodcock and other faculty members whose works are on display attended the reception Thursday, Feb. 20, along with many of their students and members of the SRJC community. The mood was cheerful as students came out to see the works of teachers present and past.
Lindy Moriarty, who has been taking art classes for fun for several years, spoke highly of a watercolor piece of a floral-print bed sheet folded in unique shapes.
“It’s an amazing color, and it’s got movement,” Moriarty said.
Mason Dabney, who recently completed work on statues for the Northern Lights festival at the Luther Burbank Center, came to see the works of his former teacher, Michael McGinnis, who teaches sculpture and design.
Between the students who came to support their teachers and the instructors’ appreciation for the students’ gallery work, it was apparent that the SRJC arts department is full of people who support each other and love what they do.
“If I was going to teach anywhere, I would want to teach here,” said Emiko Ogasawara, who teaches 3D design.
Besides being an exercise for the students, the gallery is full of art worth seeing in person. Art History instructor Justin Underhill takes his students to all art shows SRJC puts on, because he said you can’t compare seeing pictures of art to seeing it in person.
“Some mediums like ceramics are just impossible to photograph correctly,” Underhill said.
