Vortex

Developed in the course Print and Film taught by Art Professor and Chair Ron Abram, the range of student works include short films and screen-prints on a variety of materials (paper, canvas, shower curtains). In a class that uses film history and theory as points of departure for creative work, “Psycho” was selected as a icon of American cinema. Alfred Hitchcock created movies for the masses but as critic Alan Vanneman has described also “explored themes more often linked to the avant-garde than popular entertainment: loneliness, loss of identity, sexual ambiguity, passivity, voyeurism, the triumph of evil and the oppressive weight of a dead past.” In a variety of ways, the Denison student works address these themes as well. 

Exhibiting artists are: Maritza Bandera ’06, Tay Cha ’07, Jeff Craft ’06, Dustin Conley ’08, Mad Mohre ’08, Elaine Pangan ’06, Elia Prats ’07, Aaron Rosenthal ’06 , Jennifer Sroka ’07, Maureen Stemen ’07, Alexandra Van Dam, Amy Wild ’07 and Amber Yoder ’07. Through appropriation, the act of visual quoting, students have made creative and trans-formative use of imagery from the film, combined with their own interpretations and adaptations. 

The work was created in Denison’s state-of-the-art MIX lab, a collaborative digital lab for the Fine Arts division in Mulberry House. Coordinated with Acting Gallery Director Dr. Alexandra Green and Collections Manager Melinda McPeek, the installation in Burke Hall was co-designed by Professor Abram and Christian Faur, artist/technology liaison for the Fine Arts at Denison. Denison University’s Burke Hall Art Gallery will host a one night only event, “VORTEX”, an exhibition of student prints and films inspired by Alfred Hitchcock’s “Psycho”.