How Community Shapes Student Art at Dickinson
Exhibition on view through May 18
by MaryAlice Bitts-Jackson
Artistic pursuits are often solitary affairs, but at Dickinson, they’re also communal. As studio art majors in the class of 2025 prepare works for a big exhibition at the end of their senior year, they work separately, within their own studios in Goodyear. But they also join together, in the building’s shared spaces, as they fine-tune their work, co-develop an exhibition theme and design a joint exhibition and accompanying catalogue. You can view the resulting exhibition, Disparate Items, through May 18 in the Trout Gallery. The opening reception is on Friday, April 25.
A keen sense of belonging builds trust as the students give and receive peer critiques that guide them toward a more powerful body of work. These connections also create an important source of support during a consequential time in the students’ academic careers and fashion a template for community-building in the years to come.
That’s vital to students like Sophie Habecker, who works primarily in sculpture. "Collaboration and dialogue with my community fuel my creative process, helping me refine my concepts and push the boundaries of my practice," Habecker writes. "Working with a community of artists in Goodyear has been invaluable to my growth as an artist."
Many of the emerging artists have created work that directly addresses the theme of connection. Laila Gwathmey's paintings illuminate the patterns of life and the interconnectedness of living things. Catarina Acosta, a double major in studio art and psychology, reflects the ties between memories, emotions and people. Her work is inspired by the priority-binding theory, holding that humans are able to more completely and accurately recall memories associated with strong emotions.
Geoffrey Ogenrwot, a native of Uganda, conveys his experiences of transitioning to a new country and community and to new traditions, values and beliefs. “My work is ultimately about bridging worlds, making sense of identity and expressing the emotions that define our shared human experience,” he writes.
Shared histories are central to Emma Rizzella-Roberts’ paintings and to Sophie Phillips’ ceramic works. Rizzella-Roberts, a double major in studio art and chemistry, raises questions about current events—an important function of the artist’s role in society—and describes her work as a “mode of protest.” In contrast, Phillips, a double major in studio art and English, draws from a far longer historical timeline, creating ceramic art inspired by the vases of the Arts & Crafts movement and by age-old global artistic traditions.
Mbhali Edwards creates commanding illustrations, paintings and sculptures that celebrate the Afro-Caribbean community. While centering Afrocentric identity, beauty, traditions and cultures, Edwards interweaves references to mythology, spirits and deities. Mythological communities are also a focus of Trudy Chung’s work. She arranges hand-crafted ceramic creatures, reminiscent of birds, in groupings. While the figures look identical from a distance, they are, in fact, idiosyncratic and unique.
John Park and Alex Snyder voice a shared appreciation for the traditional medium of oil paint and the expressiveness it affords. Park (studio art, data analytics) uses oil to demonstrate how light, color, composition and materials transform the ways we perceive the world. For Snyder, oil’s primary appeal lies in its versatility and rich and subtle color possibilities.
Importantly, each of the students extended care and support to one another as they fashioned these works, making it possible to emerge with a sense of both personal and community accomplishment.
“What I gained the most was this experience of working through one big idea with the same group of people and getting to understand the work of my classmates better and the little community that was built,” Acosta says. “It's a very rewarding feeling, seeing all of our work displayed and knowing that we are all proud of what we put together.”
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Published April 23, 2025