The Sam Francis Gallery at

Crossroads School for Arts & Sciences Presents

CHROMESTHESIA: SOAKING IN COLOR

A student-organized exhibition.

Exhibition: Feb. 15-March 10, 2023

Opening Reception: Wednesday, Feb. 15 // 4-6 p.m.

Artists: Adam Beris, Rochelle Botello, Tim Bradley, Brittany Mojo, and Brooke Sauer

Curatorial Students: Yann Carrillo ‘23, Kate Jang ‘23, Helena Klein ‘23, Ruby Port ‘23

“Chromesthesia: Soaking in Color” is a student-organized exhibition of works by artists who contextualize color dictated by the subconscious as our minds create connections between the seen and felt. Blue is often connoted with sadness, red with anger—however, one color could certainly manifest several different emotions. “Chromesthesia: Soaking in Color” explores this phenomenon.

Brooke Sauer delicately weaves the natural world into her work. Driven by her passion for botany and the outdoors, Sauer often incorporates pressed plants, acquired when hiking, into her brilliant blue cyanotypes. The image of a small bird landing on an inviting hand in Every Day a Song confirms Sauer’s practice of creating “intimate moments…[where] nature surrounds us, it is also within us.”

Photographs from Tim Bradley’s California Dwelling series capture neighborhoods from 1978 to 1981. Untitled (Illuminated doorbell) brings on nostalgia through vignettes of a fleeting and familiar California, rich with yellow and saturated skies. Bradley brings the seemingly every day into a theatrical plane. On the other hand, Adam Beris’ paintings “celebrate and challenge traditional relationships between object, subject, foreground and background.” Blue Yodel demonstrates Beris’ use of color, organized in gridded glyphs informed by language and the pervasive influence of social media. In his recent ‘grass paintings,’ Domino and Referee, Beris draws from an existentially observational sense of place and takes a playful approach to materials. Each work, thick and layered, made by applying paint directly from the tube, represents a small patch of a recreated neighborhood park “riddled with ephemera left behind from parties, playdates and picnics.”

Down and Dirty and Day Dreamer, two sculptures by Rochelle Botello, confront the complex and contradictory nature of life. Through boldly colored structures constructed of paper, wood, and tape, Botello explores themes of stability and instability; fragility and strength; and chaos and control. Botello draws upon the absurd to visualize sensations of wonder and play, aiming to engage with ideas of existence. Brittany Mojo’s Heartburn installation is “an accumulation of soaked and saturated vessels where physical weight and labor become a dense, emotional place.” The red vessels appear to embody a visceral conviction, holding space that visually pulsates.

Ultimately, “Chromesthesia: Soaking in Color” allows visitors to pull unique meaning from each work, while invoking an orchestrated spatiotemporal synesthetic journey throughout the gallery.

The reception does not require an RSVP. During normal gallery hours, please make a reservation in advance by clicking here. Visitors must check in with security.

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