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The Dartmouth
July 23, 2025 | Latest Issue
The Dartmouth

Spheris summer exhibit showcases variety of media

The Spheris Gallery's summer exhibition features artwork from multiple artists. The exhibition is characterized by the austerity of its pieces and the innovative techniques used to create the abstract art.
The Spheris Gallery's summer exhibition features artwork from multiple artists. The exhibition is characterized by the austerity of its pieces and the innovative techniques used to create the abstract art.

The exhibition successfully maintains a sense of fluidity by using abstract pieces that create depth by either varying the coloring and lines, or contrasting negative and positive space.

Amos, for instance, creates depth in her pieces by layering several different elements, incorporating print media, painting and drawing.

The works she currently has on display at the gallery are part of her "Intersections" series. The title refers to how the crossroads of line, volume and space are continually changing and transitioning, according to Amos.

Amos decided that this dynamic could be well-represented by contrasting a natural landscape with a man-made environment, a juxtaposition common in her native Australia, Amos said.

"My work is a fusion of both land and cityscape," she said. "The Australian landscape is central to my work. It has influential references by my use of color, idiosyncratic marks and open space."

Using quick brush strokes, Amos turns her canvas into a frenetic, city-like scene of chaotic lines and dots, yet the rich, neutral paint colors used in the series give her pieces a warmth that the viewer may associate with a more rural and natural landscape.

"I wanted to record in this work the dueling intersections where the weather of landscape and the urban temperature have begun to take on new and vital relevancy," Amos said.

Like Amos, Farish incorporates earth tones in her work, using reds, browns and greens in her paintings.

Farish, who is normally a printmaker, chose to create a small series of paintings on velum for this exhibition, and described herself as a "liberated printmaker" when asked about her shift in medium.

Unlike the art of Amos and Farish, Gagnon and Mayor's pieces focus more on the stark contrast between light and dark.

Gagnon's large-scale plywood prints the most impressive pieces in the exhibition come from the artist's "Passage" series. Focusing on mark, the particular stroke of a brush, these prints are striking images of calligraphy-like lines, created through a print-making method called the sugar-lift technique, according to Gagnon.

In this etching process, the artist uses a solution of sugar and ink to paint the desired image onto a copper plate. Once the solution has dried, the image is varnished to protect the ink, while the sugar is dissolved with hot water. The plate is then dipped into acid to lift the sugar, leaving just the black ink behind to be pressed onto a piece of paper.

"What I love about this technique is the dense and rich black that is achieved," Gagnon said. "For me, black becomes the concentration of all the colors and tones of our surrounding world, concealed in all the gradations between the palest grey to the deepest black this particular interest in black allows me to access certain depths, purities and subtleties."

Rather than viewing black as a symbol of sadness and mourning, Gagnon said she feels it is a color that promotes self-reflection and can create "a silence" while maintaining a rich quality.

Gagnon said she was inspired to use black in this way by traditional Chinese paintings, in which "emptiness is a place of transformation."

"Each individual will see and feel something different from my work, according to their own disposition," Gagnon said. "I want my work to be open and not limited to one specific interpretation. The most important thing is the presence of the works and that the viewers are compelled by them."

Mayor's pieces are prints as well, but project an entirely different feel than those of Gagnon. They are composed of geometric patterns rather than vague brush strokes. The pieces are all relief prints from the same woodcut, she said. Mayor varied the prints by using different colors of ink.

These pieces are from her series, "Playing with Sol," and were inspired by the works of the late renowned artist Sol Lewitt, she said.

Mayor said that Lewitt's influence prompted her to incorporate muted hues of gray and blue.

"I've done a lot of black and white, so this is kind of a new thing for me by going into color," Mayor said. "I just think about why I want to try something new. I do it because I want to see something. It doesn't have much else to do with what other people may think."

The only aspect of the show that does not seem to fit into the show's promotion of the austere work of female artists is the incorporation of oriental rugs from Peter Pap Oriental Rugs.

Hanging on the walls alongside the prints and paintings, the rugs are pretty, but seem out of place in a modern art gallery. Even worse, they disrupt the otherwise seamless link amongst the displayed pieces.

Despite this, the exhibition is a showcase of interesting and thought-provoking art perfect for those spending their summer in Hanover. Whether through the application of mark, the use of color or the focus on space, the pieces from the four artists make for a well-rounded, abstract collection, while maintaining a common thread throughout the show.

The summer exhibition runs until July 31 at The Spheris Gallery, which is located at 59 S. Main Street.