Art & Social Change
October 9 - November 6, 2014
Opening Reception: October 9th, 5 - 7pm
Arts Lecture with Exhibition Juror Jen Delos Reyes
Art & Social Practice
October 9th, 12pm
Tillie Lewis Theatre ~ Free & Open to the Public
Exhibiting Artists
Click on Artist's Name to View Artwork /To Purchase Artwork Visit or Email the Gallery
Cayla Skillin-Brauchle - Best of Show
Theresa Devine - 2nd Place
Doug Sandelin - 3rd Place
Whitney Bandel
Lorraine Bonner
A. Eilene Carver
Michael Fischerkeller
Ron Geibel
Jennifer Lugris Park
Eugene Rodriguez
Margi Weir
David Willison
Also presenting The Art & Social Practice Workbook comprised of assignments, evaluation tools and resources exploring socially engaged art and education. The workbook is a project by Erin Charpentier and Travie Neel of the Portland, Oregon collaborative Guestwork. Visitors of
the exhibition will be able to assemble their own free workbook from printouts of the text.
Erin Charpentier
Jen Delos Reyes
Heather Donahue
Fallen Fruit
Farm School
Harrell Fletcher
Zachary Gough
Pablo Helguera
Alexi Hudon
Grace Hwang
Steve Lambert
Betty Marin
Mario Mesquita
Adam Moser
Yoshua Okon
Carmen Papalia
Douglas Paulson
Paul Ramirez Jonas
Jon Rubin
Sean Schumacher
Alysha Shaw
Molly Sherman
Temporary Services
Transformazium
Patricia Vazquez Gomez
Lexa Walsh
Caroline Woolard
Past 2D-3D Exhibitions
2013 Open Call
2012 Visual Poetry
2011 Figurative Works
Jen Delos Reyes is an artist originally from Winnipeg, MB, Canada. Her research interests include the history of socially engaged art, artist-run culture, group work, band dynamics, folk music, and artists’ social roles. She has exhibited works across North America and Europe, and has contributed writing to various catalogues and institutional publications. She has received numerous grants and awards including a Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada Grant. Jen is an Assistant Professor at Portland State University, Oregon, in the Art & Social Practice MFA Program. She is also the founder and director of Open Engagement, a conference on socially engaged art practice, and speaks widely on Art and Social Practice at conferences and institutions around the world.
Juror Statement
There is also a need outside of here: Art & Social Change
by Jen Delos Reyes
Situated in a small gallery in Paris in 2005 American artist Ben Kinmont hung upon the walls four small canvases. On each canvas was watercolor text “there is also a need outside of here.” While the work was traditional in regards to the materials of paint on canvas, and the location of the art gallery space is also par for the course, the work simply titled “Also,” points to and connects directly to an issue of social need beyond the walls of the art institution. Kinmont searched for a not-for-profit organization near the gallery and established a relationship with them. He explained to both the gallerist and the non-profit Association National pour l’Education des Chiens that his work if sold would go 100% toward the organization. Both parties agreed. While the work went unsold, Kinmont created a structure in which art had the potential to contribute to the creation of meaningful social change.
The works included in the Art & Social Change exhibition at the LH Horton Jr Gallery were culled from the call for entries to their annual 2D-3D works exhibition and awards competition. The call explicitly asked artist to submit work that focused on current social concerns including economic, gender, LGBT, race, education, environmental and that the work facilitate critical thinking and awareness of the issue being addressed. Like “Also” it was imperative that artists be looking outside the walls of the gallery and directly address art as a force for social change.
The works selected for the exhibition pay tribute to a linage of socially conscious and engaged artists. From the use of publications and printed matter in “Everything is the Truth” that harkens to its roots in conceptual art, “I’m Inviting You To Join Me On The Bandwagon Of My Own Uncertainty” which echoes the playfulness, and chance encounters that permeated Fluxus, to “The Idyllic America” series which employs similar strategies as the Situationist International media détournements, the works in the Art and Social Change exhibition all display a reverence for arts avante-garde forbearers, as well as a radical belief that all forms of art have the power to shape the world we want to see.
The works and artists included in this exhibition all point beyond the walls of the gallery and echo the idea the there is also a need outside of here. I hope visitors will leave the exhibition inspired by the creative agency of the contributors and see how they can bring creativity as a strategy to address the complex social issues and struggles of our time.