ROCKFORD UNIVERSITY ART GALLERY

Rockford University Art Gallery is always free.
Open to the public:

  • Current Gallery Hours: Tuesdays 11am-1pm, Thursdays from 2pm-5pm, Fridays 1pm-3pm 
  • Contact anorris@rockford.edu
  • Or by appointment

Contact: Gallery Director Ari Norris at anorris@rockford.edu

The Rockford University Art Gallery provides a varied series of art exhibitions and related programming in support of the Department of Art and Art History and is an important educational and cultural resource for the campus and community. The Gallery is located in the Clark Arts Center, the locus of the University’s Department of Art and Art History.

Spring 2024 Exhibitions

 

  

Quick Square

On Display: January 22nd-February 23rd

Closing Reception: February 23rd, 6-8pm

 

Paul Erschen is Department Chair and Professor of Visual Art at the University of St. Francis, in Joliet, IL and workshop leader at the ACRE art residency program in Steuben, WI. In August 2022, Erschen attended residency at Watershed Center for the Ceramic Arts ceramics in Newcastle, ME. Paul holds degrees from The Ohio State University (MFA, 2000) and Northern Illinois University, (BFA, 1998).

Gina Hunt’s practice fuses painting, sculpture, and site-responsive installation. Research interests include histories of abstraction, theories of color and perception, and imaging technologies spanning early photographic processes to spectroscopy. Working with canvas, dye, paint, scrim, and wood, her works are sites of perceptual phenomena while remaining rooted in a material-based physicality.

Gina has presented solo exhibitions at Syracuse University, The Franklin, South Texas College, 65GRAND, Western Pole and Virginia Commonwealth University School of the Arts in Qatar, among others. Two-person and group exhibitions include The Plan, STNDRD, EXPO Chicago, Tiger Strikes Asteroid, Practise, Heaven Gallery, and Circle Contemporary, among others.

Gina has participated in residencies at Chicago Artists Coalition, Badlands National Park, Hinge Arts, and Virginia Commonwealth University in Qatar. She is currently a Lecturer in Drawing and Painting at Loyola University Chicago and represented by 65GRAND.

Rockford Art Museum presents
the 83rd Annual Young
Artist Show

High School Division On Display: March 1st – March 17th
Youth Division On Display: March 23rd – April 14th 

Due to the ongoing HVAC renovation project at Rockford Art Museum, the 83rd Young Artist
Show will be held at Rockford University Clark Arts Center in 2024.

The first Young Artist Show occurred in the spring of 1941, demonstrating the Rockford Art
Association’s (now Rockford Art Museum’s) commitment to young, emerging artists in the
greater Rockford area. The exhibition included 57 artworks of various media by 28 artists,
including high school upper-classmen and college-age artists. The choice to make the Young
Artist Show a part of the museum’s annual exhibition schedule revealed the museum’s
understanding of the dynamic role that art experiences and art education play in the lives of
young people.
Since its inception, the Young Artist Show has evolved and grown to become a Rockford
tradition. Today, the popular exhibition bears a reputation of excellence, expanding from its
modest local beginnings to become a regional show featuring students from public, private,
parochial and home-school settings. It is consistently Rockford Art Museum’s most popular
exhibition of the year.
The exhibition now includes two distinct exhibits that recognize and celebrate outstanding
students and the dedicated teachers who contribute to the quality of artwork submitted. The
juried High School Division includes approximately 300 artworks by over 200 high school
students. Students entering the High School Division compete for more than $2,000 in
scholarship and recognition awards. The Youth Division includes artwork in a variety of media
by kindergarten through eighth-grade students from the Rockford area. Art teachers select the
work to be included in the exhibition. About 500 students’ pieces are displayed in the Youth
Division. Both divisions of the exhibition showcase an amazing array of exceptional student
artwork and present the strength and diversity of art programs across the region.

 

 

 

 

Rockford University Art Gallery
Clark Arts Center
5050 E. State Street
Rockford, IL 61108
815-226-4105

Contact: Gallery Director Ari Norris, anorris@rockford.edu

Admission is free.

Hours:

  • Current Gallery Hours: Tuesdays 11am-1pm, Thursdays from 2pm-5pm, Fridays 1pm-3pm
  • Contact Ari Norris
  • Or by appointment

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The gallery does not accept unsolicited exhibition proposals.