Graduation is fast approaching for the Seattle Pacific University class of 2024. Although tensions are high, students begin to mark their final capstones and reminisce about the memories made at SPU.
The SPU Art Department hosted “Earthly Bodies,” the senior photography/studio art exhibition, at the Seattle Pacific Art Center (SPAC) from April 15 to 26. “Earthly Bodies,” a final project culmination, showcased the unique work of students Macs Herdrich, Madi Stephens and Kati Chau.
Following the theme, the seniors’ exhibition examined the “spiritual connection between bodies” through various media forms, such as photography, sculpture, video and textiles. Each student had a section of the studio organized to display their creations, along with descriptions of each piece and some background information about the artist.
Alison Stigora, assistant professor of sculpture from SPU’s art department, explained the significance of the exhibit. Stigora noted how with these experiences students will start to feel familiar with the professional art community in their future endeavors.
“The exhibition is showcasing the work of three different studio art majors,” Stigora said. “Each student has developed this work as their independent portfolio from all their time at SPU.”
One of the artists presenting in the exhibition was fourth-year digital photography major Kati Chau. For Chau, photography is her passion, stemming from her first photography class in the seventh grade.
Chau described a major aspect that influences her work within photography was the passing of her mother in 2017. In her biography she says that her work “reincarnates her spirit, woven together from my memories of her.”
Displayed at the exhibition was Chau’s longtime project titled “Interwoven Solitude.” The main focus of this project was “the imprint of the human soul, which leaves a bigger impact than the physical body that is no longer with us,” Chau explained.
Among the students showcasing their work was Madi Stephens, a fourth-year art student specializing in mixed-media painting with a focus on memory and connection. Stephens’ preferred medium is paper, and all her work showcased at the exhibit involved repurposing and recycling paper to create intricate pieces.
Stephens described the process behind creating her pieces through a sustainable perspective and described how “once it’s kind of done and shown, I destroy it again and make another piece and so all my work is continually repeating.”
Her art is on a continual cycle of being destroyed, which illustrates the experience of love and sorrow. Describing her inspiration behind her works such as her piece titled “How I Reach[ed] God,” she explained, “conceptually, I like to think how we are creations of everyone that we’ve come up with and everyone that was loved, and so kind of like all the paper is a creation of itself over and over again, you’re constantly creating.”
Macs Herdrich, a senior art history and studio arts student, used found and common material to create their pieces. Herdrich had a variety of mediums displayed at the exhibit. One of the crowd favorites was their interactive piece titled “The Potential of a Soiled White Light Eternal.”
Other pieces that Herdrich showed were a series of half pictures of parts of the body that were ripped and separated on display called “Anatomy/Autonomy.” Herdrich’s display showed range in a variety of art forms from hot glue in their transparent piece titled “If Jacob’s Ladder Was Made of Glue, Our Feet Would Stick to the Rungs” to the use of recycled pantyhose in their largest piece called “Skin.”
The primary influence behind their work is the idea of “groundedness,” as “these are the type of material that wouldn’t normally be found in an art context, which I find easier to work with,” Herdrich explained.
For many of these seniors enrolled in the art program at SPU, the senior exhibition may be the last time they will all be together in one place, showcasing their work in combination with their SPU peers and their variety of mediums. This event not only showcased their impressive portfolios but also served as a memorable capstone for the artists, as well as many family and friends.
“They learn how to hang their work professionally and a lot of these skills they learned at SPU they can take out into the professional art world and they can add events like this to their professional resume and portfolio,” Stigora said.
