Exhibition Information

BFA Thesis Exhibition
December 8 - 16, 2022

Graduating candidates display their final collection of artworks supported by writing and oral presentations that fulfill the year-long thesis requirement in their designated programs. The BFA committee members, comprised of Art and Art History faculty, interacted, guided, and advised the candidates toward their last presentation over two semesters.

Explore the virtual 3D space

View images from the exhibition

Lindsey Richards, a BFA candidate originally from Liverpool, NY, presents her thesis exhibition titled Time Is Out of Joint, showcasing a collection of abstract paintings on canvas produced over an extended period of time.

The student artist navigates and reconciles the fears that come with mortality, pointing to a shared reality aligned with the universal struggle through life. Richards creates a body of work that hints at the blank 'abyss' always lurking in our vibrant surroundings. The premise for her paintings centers around a reminder that human life, as well as the environment, is impermanent. With influence from historically significant thinkers, classic stories, existentialist philosophers, and her love of cinema, Richards creates a haunting essence of landscapes that reveals the awareness of one's place in time.

Richards is currently a fifth-year undergraduate Senior at SUNY Cortland, as a Bachelor of Fine Arts Major with a concentration in Painting. Her works were included in several renditions of the annual Student Select exhibitions sponsored by the Art Exhibition Association (aka art Club) and most recently received acknowledgments from The Muriel and Newell Keegan Prize for Excellence in Studio Art. She also was a four-season collegiate athlete on the SUNY Cortland women's softball team from 2019-2022, as an NFCA All- America Scholar Athlete.

Jake Robinson, a BFA candidate, displays his thesis exhibition, In Tongues, a collection of monochromatic drawings on paper.

The body of work titled, In Tongues showcases several series of large- and small-scale drawings, sound poems, and process video pieces that explore the deconstruction of writing and speech under the contemporary movement of ‘Asemic Art.’ Inspired by artistic movements such as Dada, Surrealism, Abstract Expressionism, and Primitivism, Robinson's exhibition engages with theories in Structural Anthropology, Jungian Psychology, and general eastern philosophy.

Process-oriented drawings were inspired by a framework of a psychedelic experience, constructing a climate for a boundless, unencumbered state as a primordial condition of being. The mechanical technique explores the expressive capacities of other abstracted elements of speech, such as the consonant sound and the vowel sound. The mark-making is a physical manifestation of a fictional language illustrating glossolalia (free association; speaking in tongues) with no sanction or filter over vocalization. The immediacy of drawing with a stick of charcoal allows for the reliable yet tasteful visualization of thought and its changing form captured on paper that generates novel expressions. This body of work perceives the inefficiency of language, contemporary culture in an experiential understanding of reality, and psychosocial structures that shadow reality. The abstracted texts solidify an obscure commentary of commonly adapted social systems that prevent us from intuitively or telepathically realizing the collective experience of art.

Robinson, from Seneca Falls, NY, is a senior SUNY Cortland student in the Bachelor of Fine Arts Program with a dual major in New Communication Media and a minor in Graphic Design and Digital Media. This academic year he served as the Art Exhibition Association club president and technical support for the Dowd Gallery. His work has been awarded Honorable Mentions in the annual Student Select exhibitions in 2020 and 2021 at the Dowd Gallery and selections in the Best of SUNY exhibition in Albany 2022. He currently has work on display in the SUNY Cortland Memorial Library until mid-May of 2023.