April 17, 2018
Olivia Langley
Subjectivity can be an important factor in the way that artists communicate. It’s also part of the theme that senior visual arts majors will display through their work in the UCCS VAPA Senior Show.
Nine senior visual arts majors will display their capstone project in Double Tap, their senior showcase in GOCA 121, located on 121 S. Tejon Street. Double Tap opens April 20 and will run from 5 p.m. – 9 p.m. until May 12.
The VAPA senior capstone project is designed to be a student-organized exhibit where visual arts seniors can demonstrate their skills. According to Kristine Heinrich, a senior visual arts major and coordinator of Double Tap, the event is designed to give students a taste of life in art after college.
“It’s to prepare us for the ‘art life’ after school. It gives us an idea of what it’s like to work with a gallery, other people, and collaborate,”said Heinrich.
According to Henrich, Double Tap, references art being practiced in modern day in correlation to social media.
“The work doesn’t necessarily have anything to do with social media; it’s this idea of marketing yourself via a social media platform and what comes out of that. (It’s) this idea of liking certain types of art and subjectivity,” said Henrich.
“(There’s) a lot of individual work as well as thought provoking concepts. Some of them are more personal, some more overt, and some of them more general to the public overall.”
Paintings, videos, installations and photography will be included in the exhibit, according to Suzanne MacAulay, chair of the VAPA Department. Students work together to curate their work.
“From lighting to layout, installation and deinstallation, marketing and PR. They will be organizing the opening reception and staffing the gallery,” said MacAulay.
Various senior art shows have taken place as part of the visual arts curriculum for over a decade, according to MacAulay.
“This will be the twelfth annual Senior VAPA majors art exhibition, and it’s the first time that it will be held at GOCA Downtown,” said MacAulay.
According to Henrich, the group has been working on these pieces since the beginning of the semester.
“I’m most excited to be able to showcase my work. When you get out of school, it’s a much more rare opportunity; you’re not as motivated necessarily as an artist because of the lack of financials and resources,” she said.
MacAulay would also agree that this event is a significant one for visual arts seniors to be able to showcase how far they have come in their academic and artistic careers.
“(I have seen) immense growth clearly visible on the walls of the show. I teach the foundation level courses in visual art, so I usually see the students’ work at the beginning of their academic careers- and they travel a huge distances,” said MacAulay.
“Art is the vehicle through which we, as artists, communicate our ideas, challenge our viewers, liberate our doubts and question our environment.”
For more information on the show, visit events.uccs.edu/event/uccs_vapa_senior_show.