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Click on the Gallery name below to link to the list of past exhibitions.
Altgeld Galleries | Chicago Gallery | Jack Olson Gallery
Past Exhibitions in the Altgeld Galleries
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March 25 - May 10
Rotunda Gallery
Gabriel Bizen Akagawa: Unpacked/Offset
NIU students and community members will participate, via a series of workshops with artist Gabriel Bizen Akagawa, to create an installation designed to explore humanity's relationship to the natural world in the 21st century.
Art-shipping crates will be reused and recycled with the aim of creating work that reverberates on both personal and social levels.
A wikisite for the show is here.
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March 25 - May 10
North Gallery
Peggy Macnamara: Nature Studies
Drawings and watercolor paintings of flora and fauna as depicted by the Field Museum of Natural History's Artist-in-Residence,
Peggy Macnamara.
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March 25 - May 10, 2008
Hall Case Galleries
Specimens and Studies
Scientific specimens and taxidermied studies coincide with our spring nature-themed exhibitions.
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April 8 - May 10
South Galleries
Examining Audubon
Co-organized with Museum Studies students enrolled in Art 556, “Exhibition Interpretation,” this exhibition will focus on issues of connoisseurship, museum presentation and preservation as demonstrated through the many editions of John James Audubon prints made over the years.
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Ayomi Yoshida: Yedoensis
January 15 - March 7, 2008
Rotunda Gallery
Contemporary Japanese artist Ayomi Yoshida, fourth generation in the Yoshida printmaking dynasty, was in residency for approximately one month installing a work that will both contrast and augment the Ukiyo-e and Sôsaku Hanga displays in the other galleries. "Prunus x yedoensis" is the scientific name for a cultivated yoshino cherry tree. According to the artist, "Cherry trees seem to burst into blossom allat once, and after a day or two, drop thier petals just as quickly. In Japan they have long been emblematic of life's evanescence."
This exhibition, along with the accompanying exhibits of prints and objects from the Richard F. Grott Family, is part of the project "National/International Conciousness in Japan: Self, Place and Society During the Ninteenth, Twentieth and Twenty-first Centuries."
A publication, supported in part by the Japan Foundation, is forthcoming.
The Gallery Notes for this exhibition are available in PDF form.
Page 1 Page 2
Ayomi has created a blogsite for this exhibition.
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Revisiting Modern Japanese Prints:
Selected Works from the Richard F. Grott Family Collection
January 15 - March 7
South Galleries
Mid-twentieth century Sôsaku Hanga (creative print movement) prints were examined thematically to explore Japanese concepts of nationalism and internationalism in the modern era.
This exhibition, along with the accompanying exhibits of pottery and ukiyo-e prints, is part of the project "National/International Conciousness in Japan: Self, Place and Society During the Ninteenth, Twentieth and Twenty-first Centuries" and honors the generous donation of artwork from the Richard F. Grott Family to the NIU Art Museum.
The exhibitions were co-curated by NIU Assistant Professor of Art History Helen Nagata and NIU Professor Emerita Helen Merrritt with the assistance of NIU graduate and undergraduate students participating in Art History and Museum Studies courses.
The Gallery Notes for this exhibition are available in PDF form. Page 1 Page 2
Exhibition catalogue
Exhibition website
Sponsored in part by a Venture Grant from the NIU Foundation, the James and Helen Merritt Foundation of the NIU School of Art, the Illinois Arts Council, a state agency, Friends of the NIU Art Museum and the ArtsFund 21.
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Ukiyo-e Prints from the Richard F. Grott Family Collection
January 15 - March 7, 2008
North Gallery
Highlighting a recent gift of Japanese prints to the NIU Art Museum, 19th century Ukiyo-e prints from the Richard F. Grott Family will be examined thematically. Co-curated by Helen Nagata and Helen Merritt.
The Gallery Notes for this exhibition are available in PDF form.
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A separate Gallery Note sheds light on the Ukiyo-e printmaking process. Page 1 Page 2
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Japanese Pottery and Other Objects from the Richard F. Grott Family Collection
January 15 - March 7, 2008
Hallcase Gallery
Objects such as Bizen and Oribe ceramics, iron teapots and a wooden carving augment the exhibitions in the North and South Galleries.
The Gallery Notes for this exhibition are available in PDF form.
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NIU School of Art Faculty Biennial
October 30 - December 8, 2007
All Altgeld Galleries
All four gallery spaces will be filled with recent work by NIU School of Art faculty in a variety of studio media including painting, drawing, printmaking, sculpture, ceramics, photography, video, fiber, jewelry, metalsmithing, and design, as well as research and publications in art education, art history, foundations and design.
A related series of lectures is now listed on our events page. |
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Visit the School of Art's website.
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Body Politic
Contemporary artists explore the social
and political ramifications of identity
August 28 - October 13, 2007
South Galleries
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What we think about when we contemplate our corporeal selves, and what others assume about our identity based on their observations, make for unpredictable and fertile territory, out of which can spring myriad allusions and interpretations, including this exhibition.
Artists include Molly Carter, Mary Dritschel, Anni Holm, Coke Wisdom O'Neal, Karen Savage and Jennifer Yorke.
A brochure is available.
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Dafatir:
Contemporary Iraqi Book Art
August 28 - October 13, 2007
Hall Case and North Galleries
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A national traveling exhibition of handmade artist's books that celebrate the persistence of the artistic impulse in a nation troubled by tyranny and war. Curated by Nada Shabout at the University of North Texas, the exhibition presents work by seventeen artists spanning three generations.
More photos and information are here. |
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Some Enchanted Evening
100 Years of Evening Gowns (1900 - 1999)
August 28 - October 13, 2007
Rotunda Gallery
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An aesthetic, historical and socio-cultural look at exquisite designer gowns from the extraordinary collection of Barbara Cole Peters. Curated by Peters with extensive written commentary which will examine cultural developments of the twentieth century decade by decade.
A brochure is available.
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Josef Albers: Formulation:Articulation April 10 - May 12, 2007
Rotunda Gallery and North Gallery
This portfolio of Albers’ serigraphs provided an overview of the great educator’s theories on visual phenomena and color interaction. Museum Studies students enrolled in Art 556, “Exhibition, Interpretation and Practice” created an interpretive display, augmented by educational materials.
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High & Low: Chicago Hand Bookbinders
March 20 - April 21, 2007
Hall Case Galleries
Touring exhibition of the Chicago Hand Bookbinders 2007 annual thematic group show.
This was the 2nd exhibition in our series exploring artist-made books
(the first being 2006's Ars Libris).
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The Uncertainty Principle:
Drawing in the Golden Age of Worry
March 20 - May 12, 2007
South Galleries
The intimacy and immediacy of drawing makes it an ideal medium for quick response to the groundlessness and uncertainty that we find ourselves surrounded by in this “Golden Age of Worry”.
Artists included: Charles La Belle, Shona MacDonald, Judith Burns Mc Crae, Audrey Niffenegger, Geoffrey Todd Smith, Harrison Storms, Deb Sokolow, Stas Orlovski and Chris Uphues.
Curated by Karen Brown.
Poster available. |
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Mark Arctander: Surveillence
February 8 - March 24, 2007
Rotunda Gallery
10-year retrospective of Chicago artist Mark Arctander’s work with found objects.
Arctander humorously manipulates ordinary objects through contextual change to deliver an out-of-the-ordinary visual experience and new insight.
Brochure available. |
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The Heart of Africa
January 16 - March 9, 2007
Hall Case Galleries and North Gallery
Provides a glimpse of the Congo through palm fiber (raffia) presentation mats and clothing, ceremonial knives and carved wooden boxes, cups, and ancestral figures. Presented in collaboration with the NIU Antropology Museum.
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Beggars and Choosers: Motherhood is Not a Class Privilege in America
January 16 - February 17, 2007
South Gallery
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Sixty images by 47 of the leading documentary photographers in the United States.
Beggars and Choosers offers a strong, positive image of mothers that society may not deem quite “proper” - women considered by some to be too young, too poor, too gay, too disabled, too non-white or too foreign.
Curated by Rickie Solinger and traveled by Wake Up Arts, this exhibition aims to stimulate new thinking and conversation about motherhood, public policy, media, and politics as well as to present an outstanding set of photographs. |
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From Heaven to Earth: A Ritual to the 37 Nats
September 21 - December 16, 2006
North Gallery
The first American exhibition devoted to the popular Burmese Buddhist ceremony, the “Ritual to the Thirty Seven Nats” will explore the history and practice of this intriguing cultural phenomenon through a display of seventeen Protector Spirit statues on loan from the Burma Art Collection at NIU.
Programming in conjunction with the Center for Burma Studies. |
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Blue Sky, Black Earth: Meditations on the Meeting of Sky and Land
Oct. 26 - Dec. 16, 2006
Rotunda and Hallway Case Galleries
Group exhibition of abstract and representational Illinois landscapes which focus formally and metaphysically on the interplay of big sky and flat land.
Artists include: Anya Antonovych, Jay Paul Bell, James D. Butler, Michael Dubina, Ulrich Eigner, Harold Gregor, Michael Johnson, Andrew John Liccardo, Jeffery A. Little, Charlotte Rollman, Alice Vrazo-Delzer and James Winn.
Artists’ journals & sketches, working drawings and photos, and plein air studies were also on display.
Co-curated with Douglas Johnson, Executive Director of the McLean County Art Center in Bloomington, IL, where the exhibit traveled in early 2007.
Brochure available. |
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Location Uncertain
August 29 - November 18, 2006
South Galleries
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9 Contemporary Berlin and Chicago artists follow up on an initial international collaborative exchange called “Location Matters” exhibited at Mbassy Gallery in Berlin in January, 2006.
In this second exhibition venue, the artists are temporarily (and temporally) brought together again to share their ongoing dialogue, collaborative strategies, and imposed limits and directives for creating new work “together” across cultural and geographical spaces.
Artists include Berliners Jan Bauer, Werner Gasser, Helga Natz, Karina Nimmerfall and Daniela von Nayhauss, and Chicagoans Karen Lebergott, Tom Denlinger, Michael Piazza, and Mary Patten.
Catalogue available.
There was a parallel exhibition at Lake Forest College
from Aug. 31 - October 8, 2006;
and another at Beacon Street Gallery in Chicago during the month of September.
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Sordid and Sacred: Beggars in Rembrandt’s Etchings from the John Villarino Collection
August 29 - October 14, 2006
Rotunda Gallery
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Rarely-seen series of etchings by the seventeenth-century Dutch master unrivaled in his keen
and sensitive observations of humanity.
Organized by Landau Traveling Exhibitions, Los Angeles, CA.
Catalogue available.
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Regional Illinois Potters I: Northwest
August 28 - September 30, 2006
Hall Case Galleries
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First exhibition in an annual series highlighting contemporary ceramics from various regions in Illinois.
Artists included Ken Bichell and Stephanie O’Shaughnessy of the Menominee Wood Kiln, Charles Fach, Kent Henderson, Bill Farrell and Delores Fortuna of Galena, and Paul Eshelman and Adrienne Seagraves of Elizabeth, Illinois.
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Contents of the DeKalb Centennial Time Capsule
May 24 - through August 11, 2006
Hall Case Galleries
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| Buried during DeKalb's Centennial in 1956 and recently exhumed for the Sesquicentennial, the time capsule is a treasure trove of photographs and artifacts of life in the mid-twentieth century. |
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POP!
Contemporary Textiles influenced by Popular Culture
March 28 - May 13, 2006
South Galleries
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Group exhibition featuring humorous, poignant and critical works by Susie Brandt, Judith Brotman, Amanda Browder, Bonnie Ward Klehr, Jeff Hand, Christine LoFaso, Ai Kijima, Mark Newport, and Karen Reimer.
Curated by Christine LoFaso, Associate Professor, Fine Arts Studio, Fiber, NIU.
Catalogue essay by Shannon Stratton.
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Shot in the Arm
March 21 - May 13, 2006
North Gallery
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Exciting new additions to the NIU Art Museum collection of original prints include works by Endi Poskovic, Bill Fick, Michael Ferris, Tom Huck and Karla Hackenmiller, all artists who have participated in recent years as Visiting Artists at the NIU School of Art Printmaking Department.
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Ars Libris
March 21 - May 13, 2006
Hallway Gallery
Artist's books from
the collection of
Adrian R. Tio
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roll-run-hit-run-roll-tick-tick-
January 17 - May 13, 2006
Rotunda Gallery
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The sculpture/sound exhibition by Korean-born Chicago artist Jin Soo Kim will return to Illinois after having traveled the country for three years. Fittingly, the work deals with travel and displacement. The installation, consisting of eight steel tunnels and an audio element featuring layered sounds of ticking clocks, breaking light bulbs and clanging plates from railroad tracks, emphasizes the physical and psychological nature of travel, experience and memory.
A Brochure is available with an essay by Dominic Molon.
The DeKalb venue changed monthly with the additional
installation of workshop creations exploring similar themes.
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February 2006 Workshop participants:
Stephanie Bruton
Jen Evans
Yen-Hua Lee
T.J. Lemansky
April Macatangay
Dan Mattingly
Sherry Patterson
Daniel Prow
Michelle Ramirez
John F. Regan
Mike Taylor |
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March 2006 workshop participants:
Christine Aguirre
Timothy Dwyer
Kristin Kleckler
Mike Knierim
Neen Koebbe
Yen-Hua Lee
April Macatangay
Marcie Oakes
Gwen Rodig-Brown
Jess Witte |
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April 2006 workshop paricipants:
Melissa Bruck
Kristine Chisamore
Mike Knierim
Yen-Hua Lee
April Macatangay
Bianca McGraw
Rosie Presti
Scott Stier
Kimberly Strom |
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Joan Truckenbrod: Estuarine Spaces
South Galleries
January 17 - March 11, 2006
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A solo show of video and multimedia installations by noted Illinois artist and leading pioneer of digital art, Joan Truckenbrod.
Her work probes the threshold between the physical world and the virtual world in an immersive undulating manner that speaks of ritual and transformation.
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necessary angel
North Gallery
January 17 - March 11, 2006
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A selection of hand-printed broadsides from the Chicago Poetry Center featuring original visual art and previously unpublished poems.
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Bob Emser:
Shadow Drawing
Rotunda and North Galleries
August 22 - December 10, 2005 |
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Exhibition of recent work by internationally known Illinois sculptor Bob Emser. Creating both small scale and large outdoor sculpture, Emser deals with each piece's internal structure and how that structure is supported or becomes visible on the exterior.
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Confessions of a Dadaist:
The Era of Existence, 1979-2005, Part II:
The Imagery of Helene Smith-Romer
South Galleries
August 22 - December 10, 2005:
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This mid-career retrospective of Chicago artist Helene Smith-Romer expands and investigates the Dadaist approach to life from a contemporary feminist perspective. In her collages, artist's books, writings, and as curator of the 'I Due Art 4 You Museum', she humorously explores and evolves the traditional Dadaist ideology and employment of technology. Smith-Romer challenges both the visual surface and the viewer as she simultaneously orchestrates and balances elements of incongruity from the unconscious versus conscious, chaos versus order, the copy versus the original, found objects versus mass produced items, fabrication versus truth, and chance compared to randomness.
Catalogue with essays by Janina Ciezadlo and James Hugunin. |
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(Super Spatial):
An installation by Thomas Skomski
Rotunda Gallery
March 31 - May 14, 2005
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| Skomski's artistic involvement with water began as an undergraduate student when he placed sculptural forms into the lagoon at Northern Illinois University. Since then he has expanded his investigations to include the unique properties of water such as light refraction and fluid dynamics. His current work examines the presence of wave action in all phenomena. |
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Unseen/Unnoticed/Unspoken: Duplicity of Word and Image
North Gallery
March 31 - May 14, 2005
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Recently back from a Fulbright Scholarship in Estonia, Illinois artist and NIU alum Rebecca Keller exhibited both the assemblages she created there and new work inspired by her trip.
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The World of
Burmese Buddhism
South Galleries
October 23, 2004 - May 14, 2005
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Curated by Catherine Raymond, Director of the Center for Burma Studies at NIU, this exhibition of Buddhist artifacts dating from the eleventh through twentieth centuries will explore facets of Burmese Buddhist Art and religious practice.
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Misleading Trails
Rotunda and North Galleries
January 18 - March 13, 2005
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Artists Enrique Chagoya, Xiaoze Xie, Hai Bo, Dan Mills, Hong Hao, Ai Weiwei and Vernon Fisher create provocative art filled with layered images and information, leading the viewer away from their initial response, and down numerous trails full of unexpected meanings.
This exhibition was organized by the artists, China Art Archives and Warehouse, Bejing, and the Samek Art Gallery at Bucknell University.
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Highlights from the Permanent Collection
Rotunda and North Galleries
Oct 18 - Dec 12, 2004
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This exhibition showcased some of the finest pieces in the NIU Art Museum collection including prints by "old masters" such as Durer, Rembrandt, Hogarth, Daumier and Vuillard, tentieth century artists like Josef Albers, Karel Appel, Hans Bellmer, Giorgio de Chirico, Max Ernst, Fernand Leger, Joan Miro, Henry Moore and Man Ray; Chicago favorites like Ed Paschke, Robert Lostutter, Phyllis Bramson and Ivan Albright, and contempoary figures such as Ida Applebroog, Robert Arneson, James Rosenquist, David Salle and Donald Sultan.
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Altgeld Hall was closed for major rennovations
between 1998 and 2004.
Here are some of the shows we did in the "old" space, originally
an auditorium on the second floor:
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Contemporary Glass Sculpture
October 22 - November 25, 1998
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Contemporary artists exploring the potential of glass as a fine art medium.
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The Interior Journey
August 17 - October 10, 1998
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Group exhibition of five Illinois artists who use the motif of traveling through the landscape as a mechanism for heightened spiritual and self-awareness.
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Nick Cave: Exhibition & Performance
April 14 - May 9, 1998
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Week-long workshop culminating in a performance featuring this Chicago artist and fashion designer's unique "sound suits". An exhibition displayed some of the suits from the performance and other sculpture by the artist.
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Contemporary Stil Llife
March 5 - April 4, 1998
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Contemporary Chicago artists
David Kroll and
Maria Tomasula
rework the
traditional still life
theme.
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Harlem: Its Renaissance and After
January 12 - February 21, 1998
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Documentary photographs by James Van Der Zee and Aaron Siskind explore the Harlem area of New York City during its cultural peak in the late teens and twenties and then after the Great Depression.
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NIU School of Art Faculty Biennial
October 20 - November 26, 1997
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Multi-media
group show of
tenured and
tenure-track
faculty from the
NIU School of Art.
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Re/Collections
August 18 - October 4, 1997
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Group show of
non-traditional
photography by
Pamela Bannos,
M. Elizabeth Ernst and
Martina Lopez.
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top
Chicago Gallery Past Exhibitions (1997-2006)
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NIU MFA Exhibition
May 19 - June 17, 2006
Annual exhibition of work by the graduating NIU School of Art Master of Fine Arts degree recipients.
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Strange Fictions
March 15 - April 29, 2006
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