On March 18, students watched a recorded version of a virtual Gallery Talk on YouTube and Facebook for an art exhibition titled “Women in Art at the Field,” which featured three women artists who work at The Field Museum.
The talented works from artists Rebecca Banasiak, Peggy McNamara and Adrienne Stroup were on display from Feb. 9 to March 19. The gallery was open to the public every day from 9 a.m. to 9 p.m. These works showed how art and nature can be creatively intertwined.
For the Gallery Talk, the video was posted on Facebook and featured Mark Swain, the Chair of Art and Design, who was joined by two out of the three artists whose work was featured in the gallery.
He was joined by Rebecca Banasiak, who has been working at the Field Museum since 2001 and is also an alumnus of Lewis University, is the Specimen Preparator, which entails skinning and stuffing mammals and any other specimens that the researchers bring in.
He was also joined by Adrienne Stroup, who works as a Collections Assistant and she works with the Vertebrate Paleontology Collections at the Field Museum.
In Stroup’s art pieces, she works on a smaller scale, as well as her main medium being watercolor because with a smaller scale, she’s able to keep track of all of the intricate details of her works of art.
The third artist whose work is featured in the gallery is Peggy McNamara, who is an Artist in Residence at the Field Museum, and her work consisted of seven large detailed watercolor paintings.
Besides just celebrating Women’s History Month, they’re also celebrating their current show, “Women in Art at the Field.”
One of the purposes for holding these Gallery Talks is to learn more about the artist and the art pieces and when students view these works of art, they’re able to see what professional artists are doing in the real world, which in turn can help them discover their own potential as an artist. They also hope that students see the important connection between art and science.
“For every art exhibition, we typically hold a gallery talk with the artists so that Lewis students and the community have a chance to meet the artists and learn about the process and the inspiration involved in creating the artwork displayed,” said Art Gallery Coordinator Natalie Swain. “Discussing and learning about art is consistent with life-long learners.”
In order to get the Arts & Ideas credit, students had to watch the Gallery Talk on Facebook, on March 18 at 7 p.m., in order to receive the credit.
“Due to COVID restrictions about gatherings, we moved the gallery talks from our usual in-person format to a virtual platform so that we were still able to continue with this important part of the exhibition,” said Swain. “Now, we can have hundreds of people view the talk safely.”
Photo credit: Katelyn Leano / Campus Life Editor
