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ABOUT

Catharsis is the thesis exhibition of the 2024 graduating Fine Arts class of Mississippi State University. The exhibition contains bodies of artwork created by 17 seniors, showed and installed among three different venues – each body of work unique in content, medium and scale. 

The public reception will be on May 5, 2024 from 2 to 4 p.m. During the reception, seniors will be presenting and extrapolating on their work, both inside and outside the event.  

Fine Arts Seniors: 

Liza Ambriz

Liza Ambriz is a ceramic artist born in Mexico and raised in Madison. Her work is an exploration of compassion and awareness toward invasive and displaced species through hand-built ceramic altars. She encourages the connection between clay and nature through a lens of respect and memory. Her work is influenced by scientific illustrations, traditional Mexican ofrendas and religious symbolism.

Born in 1999, Hallie Andrews is a native of Tupelo. Although she is a printmaking emphasis student at Mississippi State University, Hallie considers herself interdisciplinary in her studies. She creates fantastical imagery that explores subject matter in realized environments as well as surreal and fractured settings. She compliments her imagery by using sculptural components as a condiut to explore the corporality of her subject matter. 

Born in Philadelphia, PA, Mary Chen is an interdisciplinary artist that mainly focuses on digital illustration, watercolor gouache and pastel. She revolves her work around narratives that are inspired by her personal experiences, imagination and social issues. Her works are heavily influenced by East Asian art.

Emily Crunk is a ceramic and mixed-media artist from Southaven. With a deep love for illustration and all things comfort, she creates blank figures that teeter between full-on comfortable casual wear to vulnerable nudity. She wants to use clay to create something typically two-dimensional in a more tactile format to create a sense of connection with her audience. Feelings can be hard to describe or talk about, and that's exactly what she aims to represent.

Gabrielle Dunn is a 23 year-old interdisciplinary artist who was born in Alabama, raised in Louisiana, and is now based in Mississippi. Her current preferred mediums are animation, painting, drawing and printmaking, and she is passionate about making immersive work that explores contemporary social issues and mental health and evokes a compassionate, empathetic response from viewers. Her undergraduate thesis work, "Cycles," is a trilogy of animated videos that investigate what it's like to feel othered and have social anxiety and depression creep into one's life and change their perception of the world around them. Gabrielle will graduate from Mississippi State University with a Bacherlor of Fine Arts in the spring of 2024. 

Madison Hart is a sculpture artist based out of Ocean Springs, MS. Madison's work revolves around abstract and non-objective forms, and primarily works in metal, masonry and wood working. She draws inspiration from growing up in the Rust Belt, caves, and geological textures. 

Maury Johnston is a passionate and dedicated painter with a keen focus on portraiture. Maury's current work explores human emotions within the context of liminal spaces. Inspired by photos she takes during her travels, Maury paints evocative portraits, adding narrative elements. Maury will graduate from Mississippit State University in May of 2024 with a Bachelor of Fine Arts degree with a concentration in painting. 

Kadence Lewis is a 21 year old artist from Colorado Springs, Colorado. Her work is an exploration of emotions and the subconscious through woodcut printmaking techniques and symbolism. She enjoys exploring self portraiture through a nonconventional lens. Her work is heavily inspired by early religous art, artistic taxidermy, and the human form. She is currently pursuing a tattoo apprenticeship and plans to work as both a tattoo artist and freelance printmaker. 

Natalie May is a Christian artist working across multiple media forms in her endeavor to cultivate truth, beauty, and goodness through art. Born in Louisiana, she spent many of her formative years in the northern part of the state before moving up to Knoxville, TN where she now lives with her family. Natalie has always found an interest in the arts seeking out classes and private lessons whenever available. Her main media of choice are acrylic, alcohol marker, and cut paper. She creates works based off her own experiences with those she loves and is interested in exploring career paths related to children's book illustration and teaching. 

Raine Phillips was raised in Lisman, Alabama. They have a vested interest in emotions and color relationships and explores these through digital mediums. Their thesis is based on escapism and is a series of digital illustrations of creatures and the places they live and inhabit. Raine's work is based on fantasy worlds that they like to go to when life gets too stressful. Titled "Gamut," they address personal feelings across the emotional spectrum like fear, hope, calm, and more. 

Chloe Ruggiero is a watercolor and oil painter based in Covington, LA. Originally from Charleston, SC, they love highly-saturated bold colors and have a distinctive visual style in their body of figurative work. With a love and focus on portraiture, their airt is driven by intimate moments between friends and loved ones, captured in their unique and colorful lens.

Jacob Siddall is a ceramic artist from Saltillo, MS. His work focuses on developing other worldly themes and concepts through a fictitious world created by an unusual extraterrestrial species. They culture and history is conveyed on the pieces created which have been uncovered.

Rabia Siddiqui grew up in a Muslim family in Huntsville, AL. This religious upbringing led to an interest in theology and independent spiritualities. Now, Rabia creates using these ideologies as a means of processing their humanity. They primarliy work in found objects, sculpture, and fiber art. 

Raised in Ridgeland, MS, Abbey Temple is a traditional and digital painter with work mainly based around portraiture and the human figure. Each of her pieces are a testament to her passion for storytelling through visuals with an aim to evoke emotions, prompt reflection, and ignite a sense of awe in those who engage in her work. She works from life or photographs as a basis for her paintings with an added element of surrealism. 

William Donovan Weathers is a 22 year old multimedia artist based in Mississippi working within the traditions of painting. In his practice, he makes use of a variety of mediums and matrices to create unconventional and subversive scenes that exist between two-dimensional and three-dimensional space. His research focuses on creating new meditations on our relationships with intimate, subconscious, and external methods of archive through the passage of time. 

Rayeanne Williams is an illustrator currently based in Mississippi. Her works are mostly focused around connected narrative elements explored through digital mediums as well as pastel and charcoal drawings. Her current work explores a story from two perspectives, the protagonist and antagonist. It explores themes of anger, loss, and violence and the cyclical nature of actions taken when these emotions are too great. 

Melanie, an oil painter from the Mississippi Delta, utilizes her own memories and lived experiences from her childhood to capture moments of connection. With the subject of stuffed animals belonging to her loved ones, she works from life to dive into the psychology of comfort objects and relationships in her work. Melanie's work aims to evoke compassion and understanding while offering a tender portrayal of humanity. 

Gallery Location and Hours

• Colvard Student Union Art Gallery (second floor of Colvard Student Union), Open Monday–Friday, 8am-10pm and Saturday & Sunday, 10am–10pm
• The Cullis Wade Depot Art Gallery (second floor of the MSU Welcome Center), Open Monday–Friday, 9am until 5pm
• The Visual Arts Center Gallery, 808 University Drive, Open Monday–Friday, 1pm-6pm and Saturday, 1pm until 4pm.