Celebrating Student Art: Winterfest at CT State Manchester

By Tahj Galberth

CT State Manchester hosted Winterfest (Dec. 12-Feb. 4), an exhibition

showcasing student artwork produced throughout the fall semester.

The pieces covered the walls of the Hans Weiss Newspace Gallery, the Adolf and Virginia

Dehn Galleria, and the Studio Art Hallway, and featured various forms of visual art, including

photography, sculpture, painting, and more.

One was a mixed-media piece by Kassandra Smith, which presents an 8-part comic and poem reflecting the joy, or sorrow, of growing up and possibly repeating generational cycles, such as addiction.

“In a cradle of warmth, we began with an inveterate, perhaps naive optimism

Starry eyes, we entered the world unguarded

We took for granted the quotidian light of day

Believing radiance was our birthright, not a passing guest...

We flock to repressive coping as instinctively as moths drift toward open flame

We were left in a fog of reverie, time refusing to move forward

When the fog lifts so does the curtain to our reality

Through clear eyes we meet the flame

And burn our vices into a new optimism”

There were colorful ceramics produced by various artists, displayed throughout the Hans Weiss Newspace Gallery.

The opening reception back in December was a grand celebration, with refreshments provided by on campus catering and musical performances by performing arts students in the SBM Charitable Foundation auditorium. This highlights the long-running relationship between the Visual Fine Arts Department and the Performing Arts Department at CT State Manchester.

The next show will start Feb. 23.

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“With My Pencil, I Wrote Myself into Being” will

be a two-month long exhibit showcasing the works of Angel Abreu, Deborah Dancy, Imo Nse

Imeh, and Kamil Peters. Their works will be on display in the Han Weiss Newspace Gallery.

According to the Manchester Visual Arts Department on Instagram the

exhibition centers drawing as a site of authorship, resistance, memory, and self-definition -

where image, word & object making becomes a way of writing oneself into history.”

This show will feature not just the opening reception and catalogue release, but the “Making

Hope and Transcendence” collaborative art workshop with Angel Abreu, and a roundtable

discussion with Abreu, Imeh, Peters, and Dancy taking place on March 3.

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Students and the public are invited to attend, with the CT State Manchester Art Department

stating through their Instagram “Come early for the conversation, stay late for the celebration.”

Here is information for the upcoming show.