Just two months after the University of North Texas grabbed headlines for removing an art exhibit, students in the College of Visual Arts & Design are opting out of campus spaces for group shows and solo exhibitions.
And at about the same time, DIY art spaces across Denton and Dallas have opened up their spaces to UNT students, showing their work in their pop-up spaces.
Ryan Semegran, a UNT CVAD alumnus and co-founder of 2 Bed 1 Bath, said a UNT senior reached out to Semegran and co-founder Kassidy Stines, about gallery — which is created from exhibition to exhibition inside their Dallas apartment.
A group of UNT art students were looking for a place to show their work. The students decided to boycott UNT galleries after officials removed an exhibit, "Ni Di Aquí, Ni Di Allá," by Victor Quiñonez from the CVAD Gallery in February. Quiñonez, a street artist best known as Marka27, had included work that criticizes U.S. Immigration Customs and Enforcement.
The university's decision brought national attention and accusations of censorship to UNT. The students' boycott meant taking art made as part of their bachelor's and master's degree studies off campus.
"I think that the fact that they're even taking their exhibitions off campus is loud enough, in my opinion," Semegran said. "I think the fact they feel scared to have their own artwork up at the school where they were taught art — it is embarrassing for me to say that I even attended that school for art."
Five UNT art students organized a group show opening on Saturday at the 2 Bed 1 Bath gallery, and titled it "Institutional Critique" to signal their displeasure with UNT. Lyn May, Alex Elmendorf, Forest Nehemiah, Aidan Kearns and Lillie Hickman installed their work in the apartment-turned-gallery. Semegran and Stine use as much of the 800-square-foot apartment as possible, with the bathroom and bedrooms being off limits.
Semegran said they are glad to be able to offer a place for the artists to show work without compromising their values.
"It's frustrating... " Semegran said. "The university is actively choosing not to show work we're learning about in classrooms. And that they feel scared to show work that's about their own lived experiences, I think that that in itself is a big indicator of the institution failing them."
"Institutional Critique" opens with a reception from 6 to 9 p.m. on Saturday, then 2 Bed 1 Bath takes reservations for additional showings in their Oak Cliff apartment.
For May and Elmendorf, both senior studio art students, it doesn't feel right to put the best work in their senior portfolios in a CVAD space, even if that space is the hallways and rooms on the fourth floor of the art building.
They said exhibiting work on a campus that removed an entire exhibit without an explanation is problematic.
But they still wanted to show their work.
Because art-making can be solitary, it is exhibitions that connect artists to each other, to curators and to their audiences. Exhibitions prepare artists for the professional side of art, teaching them to select the most appropriate pieces for an exhibit. They learn how to craft a good artist statement. They also learn how to display work and make it as accessible to viewers as possible. And finally, exhibitions give artists a chance to meet viewers and potential collectors.
"If you're just by yourself, it's kind of hard to know people and form a community," May said. "I think it's also really important for artists to talk to others who are not in their discipline."
Elmendorf said she and her peers at UNT have had to reconsider their relationship to their school after Quiñonez's show was cancelled.
"It's frustrating because our programs are supposed to be encouraging, and help us explore critical thinking and emotional expression," she said. "Whereas censorship makes us self-silence ourselves.
"So now people are scared, and they want to go with the status quo and they wanna do what will get them shown here or what will give them the good grade. And it's unfortunate."
But artists like May and Elmendorf are bucking that status quo. Spring is busy at CVAD. Underclassmen are finishing their final projects, and seniors are preparing for their final exhibitions. At this time of year, the art building's top floor is typically full of student work.
This year, one of the hallways is lined with documents signed by UNT art students, revoking permission for the university to show their work. The white sheets of paper mimic a gallery wall. They even have identical title cards. Each reads "Disrespectfully," and is signed by hand by each artist.
"I am revoking my consent as a form of protest against UNT's continuous censorship on art displayed in their public galleries," the forms read.
They reference the removal of a piece from the Student Union Gallery a year ago by Fatima Kubra, a Muslim student who removed a piece referencing the war in Gaza after critics lobbied Denton County representatives in the Texas Legislature against the exhibit, alleging it was antisemitic.
The letters also mention the Quiñonez exhibit.
"I do not want my work representing a university that refuses to promote free speech and freedom of artistic expression," the letters say. Elmendorf's letter is among them.
Next week, Anna Street Studios will show "Disrespectfully," at the pop-up gallery in Denton.
May said art students worry that the recent events will hurt the art school's reputation as one of the best visual art schools in Texas. Elmendorf said the recent turmoil damages the art school's reputation as a program with a diverse student body known for embracing rigor and a sprawl of viewpoints.
"The morale here at CVAD has been incredibly low post this event," she said. "I mean, no one's really happy. No one really wants to even put this school in their CV. I mean everyone's taking it out of their bios. Graduate students, too. Graduate students, you're in an even more susceptible position than undergrad. After your master's, you don't have a Ph.D. That's all you get."
Danielle Avram, an assistant professor and director of the SP/N Gallery at University of Texas at Dallas, said exhibitions contribute to art students' education. When universities bring professional artists into campus galleries, students meet emerging and established artists "from all walks of life and different parts of the world." When students get into shows on their campus, they're getting more education.
"We're giving them the tools to really represent themselves when they go out in the world, and also to understand what different types of jobs are available within the arts," Avram said. "You know, it's not all about just being an artist or a curator. But there are people that are professional art handlers, that do art transport, that are art historians or maybe want to work in art education. So we are really kind of giving them a holistic idea of what a life living and working in the arts can be like."
Exhibitions can also teach students how to educate viewers.
"I've definitely shown some work in the past that maybe has maybe had some challenging subject matter or maybe is borderline, I would say is, like grotesque," Avram said. "I certainly don't force what I like on other people, but I always tell my students that when they are in the gallery space and in my class to do their best to come at the work with a great deal of empathy."
Exhibitions can teach students about the time and context that art is made within, and how work can show how artists respond personally to their experiences.
"Again, that's my job as the curator, gallery director and an educator, to make sure that we are providing access to that information," Avram said.
Avram said she's aware of the heightened feelings and political rhetoric around public university art programs.
"I am very aware of the environment and just the general atmosphere of not just concerns from my perspective about what shows I'm going to curate, or host, or program, but also what students are really thinking about and what they are concerned about," she said. "From my end, I've always practiced what I think of as being responsive curating."
Responsive curating means curating shows that stem from her own interests, and also keeping the experiences and lives of UTD students. And it means making sure gallery visitors can learn as much as possible about the art right there in the gallery.
"Art can be very much about pretty landscapes or beautiful portraiture, but it's so much more than that, and has been since its inception," Avram said. "So for me to pretend or shy away from anything that might be kind of challenging would really be a disservice to the world that I love so much."
May and Elmendorf said art students considered it an insult to injury that the art made in protest of the university's action was removed.
They aren't alone in their criticism. On Thursday, the Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression released a statement about the university removing the protest art placed around the art building in protest of the removal of Quiñonez's art.
In images of the power washing shared with the Denton Record-Chronicle on March 24, the exterior walls at the art building were bare, a memorial flag, candles and handwritten messages were all gone. Video taken by students shows what appears to be a facilities staffer washing the chalk from the pavement just outside of the CVAD gallery.
"UNT has the right to clear protest materials that obstruct walkways or prevent other normal uses of its space," William Harris a strategic campaign specialist for FIRE, said in the opinion piece. "But chalk and posters generally don’t do that, and the off-hours power-washing suggests the school might not be cleaning up campus so much as silencing its critics."
In a photo shared with the Denton Record-Chronicle in March, protest art and messages written in chalk were removed from the breezeway at the College of Visual Arts & Design in Denton.The Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression released a statement on April 23 saying the removal of the protest messages and art is viewpoint discrimination. Courtesy image
Harris said the U.S. Supreme Court has ruled that targeting expression based on viewpoint is a form of content discrimination.
The university has policies governing chalking on university property, and that chalking vertical structures is prohibited. But there aren't rules against chalking sidewalks and flat, paved areas, Harris said.
In a photo shared with the Denton Record-Chronicle in March, protest art and messages written in chalk were posted and written in the breezeway at the College of Visual Arts & Design.The Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression released a statement on April 23 saying the removal of the protest messages and art is viewpoint discrimination.Courtesy photo
"Video footage shows that at least some of the chalking removed at the behest of administrators was on university sidewalk space outside the College of Visual Arts & Design building, where school policy explicitly allows chalking," he said. "Even when it comes to chalking in restricted areas, staff comments suggest the school normally just lets the elements wash the messages away."
The Denton Record-Chronicle reached out to multiple UNT art faculty members for an interview about students leaving campus spaces reserved for art, but none had responded by Thursday night.
LUCINDA BREEDING-GONZALES can be reached at 940-566-6877 and cbreeding@dentonrc.com.
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