Growing up in an urbanized part of Israel, Jenny Kroik, a graduate student studying painting in the University’s Department of Art, didn’t see much nature, and would paint trees and flowers from images.
For “Garden” – a colorful abstract piece made with acrylic paints, charcoal and oil pastels – she studied the connection between working from pictures as opposed to subjects in person.
“I never had a chance to draw from nature,” she said. “You look at paintings of nature and think what your relationship with it is and how close you are to it.”
Kroik debuted her art Monday in the Master of Fine Arts Group Show, a collection of art by the department’s first-year graduate students. The show will remain in the LaVerne Krause Gallery, located on the first floor of Lawrence Hall, for the duration of this week.
The students used a variety of media, including paint, photography, printmaking, sculpture and mixed media, such as Tim Meyer’s “Apple Parody,” inspired by the Apple Computer icon.
“I’m a digital artist, so I sit and stare at (the icon) when I’m waiting for videos,” Meyer said, explaining his inspiration.
Meyer used two project boxes, which were painted white, to resemble a pedestal on which an apple, also white, was placed. Inside each of the project boxes was a recording machine – which said “An apple a day keeps the doctor away,” recorded with Apple’s speech program. An apple-scented air freshener and a ping sensor were also added

“It judges distance,” Meyer said of the sensor. “At one distance, it’ll just light the LED on the front. At another, it says the message and if you get close enough, it’ll spray you.”
John Paul Gardner, whose concentration is in sculpture, made “Containment” using steel and local pine needles he’d collected.
“Containment” features several makeshift outlets, in which the pine needles stick out from five different pieces of white-painted drainpipe.
“The whole idea behind this juxtaposition is nature vs. man-made compost,” said Gardner, whose inspiration was born from the plants he’s seen growing on construction pipes on the sides of buildings. “The organic matter is deadening as it’s entering the three-dimensional space.”
Of the 20 pieces of art around the gallery, “Garden” was Aida Jolosheva’s favorite.
“I like the colors,” said Jolosheva, a first-year graduate student majoring in international studies. “It’s very bright, like spring-y. I can see the mood of the person who’s drawing it. It inspires me.”
Ceramics professor Sana Krusoe was also impressed with the show, particularly since the students were able to have it ready on the first day of the term. She thought the pieces were great, though she was not surprised.
“They come in at a pretty advanced level,” she said. “The standards of accepting graduate students are pretty high.”
Krusoe said that compared with undergraduates, graduate students are generally older, and more experienced and established as artists, which always intrigues her.
“(Their work) is less mediated by the environment here and that’s really interesting,” she said. “I think they’re wonderful, a nice dose of irreverence.”
Meyer said the show turned out well, despite being put together so quickly and having no discernible theme.
“It’s a good cross-section from a variety of things, from painting and sculpture,” Meyer said. “It’s a little scatterbrained showing, but it looks nice.”
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