Department of Art History

On a sunny Saturday in November, nine students travelled to Greencastle, Indiana to see the exhibition Beyond: Tapestry Expanded at the Richard E. Peeler Art Center at DePauw University. The exhibition, curated by Erica Warren, featured works, by thirty-six contemporary artists, that examine and interrogate the denotative and connotative potential of "tapestry" as a well-used, and seemingly well-known, designation. Artists’ engagements with the language of textiles can be read across, between, and beyond medium-specificity and the objects in the exhibition convey the capacious and generative atmosphere created when artists embrace the conceptual and practical potential offered through a materials-based approach. Students, both undergraduate and graduate, spent time looking closely at the objects and discussing the practical logistics as well as the conceptual framing required for exhibition making.