Reflecting on the Past/Dreaming the Future

The Hampden Gallery Triennial is a juried exhibition showcasing cutting-edge works by emerging and established artists working in all media. It is a platform that reinforces Hampden Gallery’s mission to foster creativity and advance the careers of artists at all levels. Works were selected through an artist call open to those living or working within fifty miles of UMass.

While the Main Gallery portion of the exhibition is now closed, a special portion reopens during the spring semester in the gallery's Incubator Project Space.

Nick Capasso: Juror's Statement

I am thrilled to serve as the inaugural juror for the Hampden Gallery Triennial, a new exhibition that celebrates artistic voices living or working within fifty miles of UMass. As director of the Fitchburg Art Museum, where I steward our own annual juried exhibition, I understand the power of such a show and its role as a locus for creativity in the community.

In choosing works for the show through an online artist call, I was guided by two criteria: the quality of the individual artworks and the exhibition’s over-arching theme: Reflecting on the Past/Dreaming the Future.

Determining aesthetic quality can be a tricky business. It is admittedly subjective. I identified artworks that stood out both visually and conceptually, with strong craftmanship, clear intent, and consistency. I looked for artworks that offered new expressions — works that sparked an intellectual, psychological, or emotional response.

The exhibition’s stated theme, Reflecting on the Past/Dreaming of the Future, further shaped my selections. Many works involve overt references to times gone by, like Louise LaPlante’s silhouette figures in How to Train Your Raven and Susan Montgomery’s feminist historical watercolor portraits. Others suggest times ahead, including Anita Hunt’s Dystopia collages and Toby Barnes’s batik-based works. But most others are far more personal, metaphorical, or enigmatic, like Madge Evers’s cyanotypes, Elizabeth Stone’s Light Beings, and Kellie Murphy’s Pixie DNA.

And, of course, I freely admit that my personal tastes and interests played a role in the process. I am especially interested in beauty, not as an end unto itself, but as a form of visual eloquence that helps to persuasively tell a story or create a mood.

I endeavored to put together a set of artworks that would, both obviously and subtly, create a mental and aesthetic space for visitors to consider what has come before and what is yet to be.