Namdoo Kim works within the tension of ceramics and glass to explore the dynamics of societal demands. While growing up in South Korea, the artist witnessed the consequential effects on families of an accelerated Western consumerism shaped by the country’s emerging economy. Kim explores these concerns about materialism’s impacts through his sculptures by melding together the radically different and yet complementary materials of ceramics and glass in his sculptures. Ceramics is a medium that cannot revert to its original state once fired. For the artist, it represents enduring values and societal permanence. Glass, which can transition into other forms once heated, symbolizes values that are transient, replaceable, and subject to change. Kim’s sculptures are evocative of small children or doll-like creatures. The objects suggest a sense of playfulness while simultaneously unveiling a critical eye towards the complexities of social pressures.

The Ezra and Cecile Zilkha Gallery showcases a selection of work from the Class of 2025’s thesis students in the Department of Art and Art History’s Art Studio Program. Works shown are in drawing, painting, printmaking, photography, sculpture, mixed media, and architecture. The exhibition is curated by students as part of a tutorial in curatorial practice.

A reception for Selections from the 2025 Senior Theses in Studio Art Exhibition will take place Saturday, May 24 from 2:30pm to 4pm; with remarks at 3pm in the Ezra and Cecile Zilkha Gallery

Associated most typically with the European Renaissance, copperplate engraving proved a vital and expansive method of printmaking for numerous artists working after the dawn of the 20th century. Some artists found the deliberate, systematic process of engraving lines, one by one, into copper plates to be a useful method for recording the people and places of their modern world. Others believed that engraving could be a productive process in avant-garde movements like Surrealism. Engraving continues to be practiced today by artists who engage with the technique’s deep history while deriving ever new forms and meaning from it. The exhibition Engraving after 1900: A Technique in Its Time features artwork from the Davison Art Collection, including works by Stanley Anderson, Stanley William Hayter, Dorothy Dehner, Norma Morgan, Anton Würth, Andrew Raftery, Jean-Émile Laboureur, and many others. 

On the Road with Hiroshige is a co-presented by the Davison Art Collection and ARHA 263A, taught by Talia Andrei. 

As Wesleyan's second co-ed class, 282 men and 158 women of 1975 experienced and shaped the evolution of an institution in major transition -- one of many elite all-male schools that admitted women in the 1970s. By the time we graduated, Wesleyan's all-male culture had largely disappeared from undergraduate life. But when we started, women constituted less than 25% of the student body. How did that affect mens' and women's experiences as students and later in life? We'll share memories of the good, the bad and the downright ugly aspects of living through the transition to full co-education and the lasting impacts that experience has had on us.