BFA seniors exhibit capstone work

A stressful time is upon seniors preparing for graduation, particularly for the nine Southeast Missouri State University seniors presenting their work in the Department of Art's BFA Graduating Seniors Exhibition.

The students will showcase four exhibitions, each lasting a week. The River Campus Art Gallery will showcase the artists' work April 20 through May 15.

Kristin Powers Nowlin, gallery coordinator, will oversee the exhibition and is excited for her students' future.

"The BFA students are required to take a capstone course in which they produce the artwork for the BFA Exhibition," Powers Nowlin said in an email interview. "They usually do this in their last semester at Southeast. They produce work in the area of their specialization, which could be ceramics, digital art, graphic design/illustration, painting, printmaking and sculpture. ... This spring there are four, one-week exhibitions scheduled."

The exhibition is planned out by each student based on how they want their work to be displayed. The student must take into account the gallery space and begin thinking about how to best utilize that space to best create an environment for their work.

Krista Miller, a senior at Southeast, is one of the nine students whose work will be on display. Miller has been preparing for her capstone project since the beginning of last semester, although she admits she's been thinking about ideas and concepts for it since she first laid eyes on the exhibition her freshman year at Southeast.

Miller concentrates in graphic design. She has worked on creating a website as her capstone. The intricacies involved to make navigation of the site is her main focus.

"In designing the website, my goals were to make it easy to navigate and also visually interesting to keep the user on the site," Miller said. "I worked heavily on the design of the website layout as well as choosing the color scheme and working with typographical hierarchy to make it visually successful."

According to Miller, typographical hierarchy is a system used to organize type allowing the reader to easily find what they're looking for.

"For myself and for most art majors, the BFA capstone project is the culmination of all I have learned in my years as a student at Southeast and a chance for me to showcase my skills and best ideas," Miller said. "The project is a chance for me to test my skills on a concept that is uniquely my own."

The first exhibition will be on display April 20-24, with a closing reception from 5 to 7 p.m. April 24. The second exhibition shows April 27-May 1, with a closing reception from 5 to 7 p.m. May 1. The third exhibition displays May 4-8, providing a closing reception from 5 to 7 p.m. May 8. The fourth and final exhibition will be open May 11-15, with the final closing reception being held from 5 to 7 p.m. May 15.

Both the exhibitions and receptions will be held in the River Campus Art Gallery located in Seminary Building Room 106. The gallery's hours are 1 to 5 p.m. Monday through Friday and 1 to 7 p.m. on first Fridays. All exhibitions are open to the public.