View All Past
Small white and tan zebra stripped ram sculpture. The ram's body is globular with one star detail by its shoulder. One hoof comes out under the head on the left. The head is angled down slightly and two ram horns curl by the side of its head.
March 20 - September 19, 2021

March 20 - September 19, 2021
Wonderscape

A “wonderscape” is completely imaginative, two words and ideas fused together to connote an abstract unseen space that hovers on the edges of our imagination.  Rather than being a word with a concrete definition, it evokes an idea.  A wonderscape concerns perception, our awareness of reality and our presence within it, and the visual results are works that are part sci-fi, part fantasy.  The forms that fill a wonderscape are also fluid, they are what we create when we imagine the shape of things rather than seeing them concretely. 

We are living in anxious and unsettled times.  It seems as if we are hovering on the precipice of something unknowable, enhancing an ever-present sense of unease.  The tension and urgency filling our daily lives makes us yearn for alternate realities. Escapism can bring solace to an anxious mind.

If escapism were visual, and we were to picture our stream of consciousness, what would that look like?  For the artists in this exhibition, this process starts with basic organic forms coming together to create visually stimulating landscapes.  Their shapes evoke neural pathways, biomorphic forms, fluid yet intricate patterns, and broad expanses of color.  These are imagined, fantastical, mental landscapes—wonderscapes.

Using circles, organic forms, and undefined borders five artists working across media create their own wonderscapes.  They use the tactile nature of their materials to convey hazy, stream-of-consciousness, otherworldly dreamscapes based in reality but largely products of the mind.  In focusing on elemental forms, each of these artists crafts their own narratives about time and space and the ways in which we visualize, cope, and move through our own “wonderscapes.”

 

Gallery: Litowitz Family Gallery, Hallway, Works on Paper
Dates: March 20 - September 19, 2021
Participating artists: Adria Arch, Dana Filibert, Nancy Hayes, Alyssa Minahan, and Neil Wilkins
Facebook
Twitter
Instagram
Artwork with a white background and a ground of hazy orange and green with thin lines and outlined circles in white. Above this is a bubbly thin ribbon in orange with green, blue, and pink filled circles.
Neil Wilkins, Laminae Re 29, Encaustic
Large blue bull with a rounded globular body. It's head is up slightly to the left giving a sense of motion, with one leg raised off the ground. There are white floral details on the bull's back.
Dana Filibert, Bull in a China Shop
Intricate artwork primarily of circles with conjoining lines in cell-like structures. A deep blue background is on the bottom left with a yellow-cream throughout the rest. There are tan outlined circles filled with light blue floral patterns, swirling green circles, and purple dotted circles. Beneath the center are dark blue and dark teal circles seen through the tan outlined circles.
Nancy Hayes, Pores and Orbs 3 , 2014, Acrylic on Board
Artwork with green-white background with the bottom two thirds having a waving line of laminated colors in orange, purple, brown, and green, with circled of filled in green hues and red hues. Above is a textured white wave and a bubble thin intertwined wave of green and purple.
Neil Wilkins, Laminae transience 40, Encaustic
Intricate artwork primarily of circles in a cell-like structures. Brown hues are on the upper left with a few blue filled circles, brown and yellow circles in the center, and a peach-pink filled in space on the lower right side.
Nancy Hayes, Pores and Orbs 2 , 2014, Acrylic on Board
Artwork of a cream-white background with wave across the center of laminated colors in green, purple, and blue. There are green, orange, and yellow dots across the surface. There is a thin bubbly ribbon form in orange across the top.
Neil Wilkins, Laminae transience 44, Encaustic
Intricate artwork in two vertical rectangles with cell-like shapes in browns, greens, purples, pinks, and white dots.
Nancy Hayes, Spotlight 10 , 2018, Acrylic on Board, Diptych
Metal sculpture in black of a raven's head looking back over its body. Its body is made of circular globs, has no feet or wings, but a long tail like structure that ends in a single foot.
Dana Filibert, Raven Raven
Intricate artwork in two vertical rectangles with cell-like shapes. There are brown wavy details outlined in light blue surrounding a large structure in a peach-pink meshed outline and an interior of bright green, yellow, and light blue circles. This leads to a smaller inner section of more brown wavy sections surrounding cell-like structures of pink hexagons with deep pink dots in the center of each.
Nancy Hayes, Pores, Orbs, and Spores , 2013, Acrylic on Board
Small white and tan zebra stripped ram sculpture. The ram's body is globular with one star detail by its shoulder. One hoof comes out under the head on the left. The head is angled down slightly and two ram horns curl by the side of its head.
Dana Filibert, RamTap
Blurred photograph of a light grey background with strip of black at the bottom. In darker grey are ghostly forms of leafless trees.
Alyssa Minahan, Have I Told You?
Interior gallery room with white walls and tan wood floors. Handing on the back wall and in arched forms from the ceiling are amoeba like shapes in bright colors, some with other shapes cut out from the centers.
Adria Arch, Lost and Found , 2021
Abstract photograph of solid colors. A light blue-olive green dominates with a slice of pink vertically from top left to center bottom hugs the right side.
Alyssa Minahan, Photogram
Artwork with a white background and a ground of hazy orange and green with thin lines and outlined circles in white. Above this is a bubbly thin ribbon in orange with green, blue, and pink filled circles.
Neil Wilkins
Laminae Re 29 , Encaustic
Large blue bull with a rounded globular body. It's head is up slightly to the left giving a sense of motion, with one leg raised off the ground. There are white floral details on the bull's back.
Dana Filibert
Bull in a China Shop
Intricate artwork primarily of circles with conjoining lines in cell-like structures. A deep blue background is on the bottom left with a yellow-cream throughout the rest. There are tan outlined circles filled with light blue floral patterns, swirling green circles, and purple dotted circles. Beneath the center are dark blue and dark teal circles seen through the tan outlined circles.
Nancy Hayes
Pores and Orbs 3 , 2014, Acrylic on Board
Artwork with green-white background with the bottom two thirds having a waving line of laminated colors in orange, purple, brown, and green, with circled of filled in green hues and red hues. Above is a textured white wave and a bubble thin intertwined wave of green and purple.
Neil Wilkins
Laminae transience 40 , Encaustic
Intricate artwork primarily of circles in a cell-like structures. Brown hues are on the upper left with a few blue filled circles, brown and yellow circles in the center, and a peach-pink filled in space on the lower right side.
Nancy Hayes
Pores and Orbs 2 , 2014, Acrylic on Board
Artwork of a cream-white background with wave across the center of laminated colors in green, purple, and blue. There are green, orange, and yellow dots across the surface. There is a thin bubbly ribbon form in orange across the top.
Neil Wilkins
Laminae transience 44 , Encaustic
Intricate artwork in two vertical rectangles with cell-like shapes in browns, greens, purples, pinks, and white dots.
Nancy Hayes
Spotlight 10 , 2018, Acrylic on Board, Diptych
Metal sculpture in black of a raven's head looking back over its body. Its body is made of circular globs, has no feet or wings, but a long tail like structure that ends in a single foot.
Dana Filibert
Raven Raven
Intricate artwork in two vertical rectangles with cell-like shapes. There are brown wavy details outlined in light blue surrounding a large structure in a peach-pink meshed outline and an interior of bright green, yellow, and light blue circles. This leads to a smaller inner section of more brown wavy sections surrounding cell-like structures of pink hexagons with deep pink dots in the center of each.
Nancy Hayes
Pores, Orbs, and Spores , 2013, Acrylic on Board
Small white and tan zebra stripped ram sculpture. The ram's body is globular with one star detail by its shoulder. One hoof comes out under the head on the left. The head is angled down slightly and two ram horns curl by the side of its head.
Dana Filibert
RamTap
Blurred photograph of a light grey background with strip of black at the bottom. In darker grey are ghostly forms of leafless trees.
Alyssa Minahan
Have I Told You?
Interior gallery room with white walls and tan wood floors. Handing on the back wall and in arched forms from the ceiling are amoeba like shapes in bright colors, some with other shapes cut out from the centers.
Adria Arch
Lost and Found , 2021
Abstract photograph of solid colors. A light blue-olive green dominates with a slice of pink vertically from top left to center bottom hugs the right side.
Alyssa Minahan
Photogram

Don’t miss our virtual talks with the artists of Wonderscape!

 

Learn more about their process, materials, inspirations, and more.  Our virtual artist talks are free with registration via Eventbrite.  See below for details.

Alyssa Minahan:  Sunday, May 23, 3:00 via Zoom; register here

Neil Wilkins: Sunday, July 18, 3:00, via Zoom

Juried Exhibition
The Danforth Annual Juried Exhibition 2024 is coming up! Stay tuned for information about this year's registration and jurying process.
Event Calendar
See what events are coming up at the Danforth Art Museum and School!
Event Calendar