Richard F. Brush Art Gallery

Richard F. Brush Art Gallery Named in recognition of the generosity of Richard F. Brush '52, the Gallery is an academic resource of St. Brush Art Gallery.

Featuring rotating exhibitions of work by regional, national and international artists; a permanent collection of over 7,000 artworks and artifacts; digital image collections for teaching and research; and educational programs, class visits, and tours. Lawrence University, an independent liberal arts institution. The mission of the Gallery is to acquire, preserve, interpret, exhibit, and otherwise

make accessible works of art, in support of the educational goals of the University and for the benefit of the community at large. Programs and activities are designed to balance a range of disciplinary and interdisciplinary objectives, in recognition of diverse functions and meanings of art. As such, the Gallery provides a forum for the creative and critical expression of artists, historians, and curators. The stewardship of the University's permanent collection and a program of temporary exhibitions are the central components of the Richard F. Related activities such as lectures, panel discussions, residencies, tours, acquisitions, conservation projects, and campus displays provide aesthetic, educational, and cultural opportunities for a variety of audiences.

“Where the Rain Still Falls,” “Untitled,” and “Untitled” by Sean Patrick Wiseman SLU ‘26 are part of the AAH SYE Exhibit...
05/13/2026

“Where the Rain Still Falls,” “Untitled,” and “Untitled” by Sean Patrick Wiseman SLU ‘26 are part of the AAH SYE Exhibition ‘Whose kids are these?!,’ which is on display at the Art Gallery until May 16, 2026.
 
The central painting depicts a singular figure standing under an umbrella composed entirely of leaves, where rain falls only beneath its canopy, leaving the surrounding landscape dry and fractured. Where the rain hits, the earth flowers and plant life blooms, showing signs of regeneration and hope. The unnatural scenario illustrates a central paradox: the very systems that sustain human and plant life alike are actively being degraded.
 
My work uses surrealism to explore the environmental consequences of deforestation and drought, and the role humans play within these issues. The umbrella symbolizes nature as a source of survival that is increasingly diminished. By isolating the rainfall underneath the umbrella, the painting reflects the instability of relying on what is simultaneously being destroyed.
 
The additional drawings extend these ideas through symbolic contrasts between growth and absence, reinforcing the delicate balance between destruction and regeneration. Together, the works reflect both the urgency of environmental decline and the enduring potential for recovery.
-Sean Patrick Wiseman
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Sean Patrick Wiseman is an Art & Art History/Studio Art and Business in the Liberal Arts double major and a member of the men’s lacrosse team. His work is deeply informed by his connection to the natural world and shaped through extensive time spent skiing and hiking in the Adirondack Mountains. These experiences have fostered a strong appreciation for the environment, which serves as a central influence in his work. Through his work, Wiseman explores contemporary environmental issues, particularly the impact of human activity on natural systems and the role individuals play in both contributing to and addressing these challenges.

“The Elephant in the Room” by Sofia Zareizadeh SLU’26 is on display at the Art Gallery until May 16, 2026. This piece re...
05/12/2026

“The Elephant in the Room” by Sofia Zareizadeh SLU’26 is on display at the Art Gallery until May 16, 2026.
 
This piece reflects the tension of living between two realities: being physically safe, while loved ones remain in danger far away. It speaks to the experience of diaspora and the quiet weight of separation.
 
The central figure sits on three forms representing my family, showing how love and community uplift and support us, even from a distance. Her eyes are closed in denial and rejection of reality, yet slightly open revealing an awareness she cannot fully escape. From her hands, strands of thought emerge, expressing the constant flow of overwhelming and inescapable thinking. The “elephant in the room” represents an unspoken issue something everyone is aware of, yet chooses not to acknowledge. People remain in their comfort, avoiding it, while those directly affected are left to endure it in isolation. Her hair moves like waves of overthinking, carrying fish that symbolize hope. As the fish fall to the ground and die, they reflect false hope-hope that once existed but could not survive. Next to the pond lies my cat hunting fish in the pond. Between her legs, a group of candles burns slowly, marking the passage of time; quiet, painful, and unavoidable.
 
Together, these elements express the grief, distance, and emotional complexity of leaving behind loved ones. The drawing includes the text from a note found in a pocket of an Iranian soldier martyred during the recent war that reads, “ The world is a bad place, because even if you gain it all, you have gained nothing, but that is also the beauty of this world even if you lose it all, you have in reality lost nothing.”
-Sofia Zareizadeh
 
To learn more about this exhibition, please click the link in our bio. Thank you.

“Self-portrait #1,” “Self-portrait #2,” and “Self-portrait #3” by Kyle Hunter Rivard SLU ‘26 are part of the AAH SYE ...
05/12/2026

“Self-portrait #1,” “Self-portrait #2,” and “Self-portrait #3” by Kyle Hunter Rivard SLU ‘26 are part of the AAH SYE Exhibition ‘Whose kids are these?!,’ which is on display at the Art Gallery until May 16, 2026.
 
For the past couple of months, all I have heard the people in my life ask is the same old question: “What are you planning on doing after graduation?” I have been lucky enough to secure a job in carpentry, but I still cringe when people ask that question. I have had a lot of changes in my life recently, which have left me daydreaming about my past and future much more often. I have come to the realization that due to the time I have spent daydreaming about the future and past, I have missed what is really in front of me.
 
For this series, I painted myself in the present by looking through a mirror so I can truly experience who I am at this very moment. Throughout the spring semester, I have noticed that working on this project has led me to be more present in my everyday life. Today, there are so many different distractions right at our fingertips. Being able to separate myself from those distractions and put myself in the moment for a couple of hours as I painted made me appreciate the things that I have right now.
 
To go further in my process of living in the present, I have deleted all my social media, which has given me more time to dive into my other passions. It’s given me a clearer picture of who I am and what I like and don’t like.
 
When I started this series of paintings, it was just something interesting to do for my senior seminar, but as I got further into it, the idea of the project has made its way into my everyday life.
-Kyle Hunter Rivard

“Anar (the pomegranate)” by Sofia Zareizadeh SLU’26 is on display at the Art Gallery until May 16, 2026. This piece imag...
05/11/2026

“Anar (the pomegranate)” by Sofia Zareizadeh SLU’26 is on display at the Art Gallery until May 16, 2026.
 
This piece imagines the world as a pomegranate. Like its many seeds, we exist as individuals yet remain deeply connected and dependent on one another. Together, we form a whole.
 
Encircling the pomegranate is a poem by Persian poet Saadi Shirazi (1210-1291):
 
“Human beings are members of a whole,
In creation of one essence and soul.
when one person suffers, others feel it too.
Empathy is what binds us.”
 
On the right, I portray myself within the contradictions of this world. One side is smiling and light, while the other is heavy and downcast. This reflects the dual nature of human experience: the coexistence of joy and sorrow.
 
The pomegranate holds deep significance in Persian culture, symbolizing life, unity, and interconnectedness.
-Sofia Zareizadeh

“Untitled,” “Bunkers,” “Lost In the Storm,” and “Lost at Sea” by Lilly Ritchie SLU ‘26 are part of the AAH SYE Exhibitio...
05/11/2026

“Untitled,” “Bunkers,” “Lost In the Storm,” and “Lost at Sea” by Lilly Ritchie SLU ‘26 are part of the AAH SYE Exhibition ‘Whose kids are these?!,’ which is on display at the Art Gallery until May 16, 2026.
 
Over the course of the spring semester, I have used painting to explore abstract landscapes and seascapes. The works on display depict a golf course, a seascape, and two autumn scenes inspired by Canadian artists in the Group of Seven.
 
These paintings refer to landscapes that have made me pause and reflect. In each painting, a partition between sky and land or sea causes an abrupt shift. In one of the autumn scenes, a swirling, almost storm-like form interrupts a warm sunset, suggesting a moment of unease within beauty. In another, saturated reds and oranges flatten and blur the landscape, emphasizing intensity. The seascape moves toward cool blues and isolation, where a single distant form sits within a vast, open space, evoking distance, solitude, and contemplation. I have painted the golf course with a bird’s-eye view to emphasize the abstract shapes of the greens and bunkers.
Color can carry emotion more powerfully than detail, and that guides my work. Rather than focusing on precision, I allow paint strokes to remain visible through thick, smudged, or translucent modeling. The process itself becomes part of the meaning. The landscapes are less about place and more about feelings I’ve experienced.
 
Together, these works form a continuum between chaos and comfort, inviting viewers to sit within the shifting emotions of each scene.
-Lilly Ritchie
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Lilly Ritchie grew up in Toronto, Ontario, and has spent time canoeing the lakes of Algonquin Provincial Park. As a senior Art & Art History major, she hopes to become an art curator. Over the summers, she accepts private commissions to paint architectural landscapes. She is also interested in digital marketing, college, and Formula 1 race car driving.

“Tre Statue della Fonte Gaia” by Adeline L. Riesenberger SLU ‘26 is part of the AAH SYE Exhibition “Whose kids are these...
05/08/2026

“Tre Statue della Fonte Gaia” by Adeline L. Riesenberger SLU ‘26 is part of the AAH SYE Exhibition “Whose kids are these?!,” which is on display at the Art Gallery until May 16, 2026.
 
Adeline Riesenberger is a double major in Psychology and Art & Art History and a member of the volleyball team. She grew up in Rochester, New York, always creating in various media, including drawing, painting, jewelry, printmaking, and ceramics. She takes inspiration from nostalgia, nature, and art history. Visit her website at www.alrcreative.weebly.com for more information.
__________
This year, for the Studio Art Senior Year Experience exhibition, rather than identifying or working toward an overall theme, we each focused inward, creating art that is independently meaningful to each person.
 
Through this filter, we imbued our own artistic identities and visions into each creation.
Our images vary in subject and meaning, from environmental issues and in consideration of wild animals, to memories and reflections on one’s growth as an individual. Using various techniques, each work becomes special, cared for, and intensely personal. From painting, ceramics, and printmaking to digital collage, photography, and video, we each highlighted the particular essence that makes us artists.
 
As the artworks grew and developed over the past four months, they became like our children,
and each artist parent is proud but a little bit angry with their work. These images are our loves, and the resulting artworks are the kids born from that love.

“Ravenna,” “Riomaggiore,” “Cortona,” “Assisi,” and “Firenze” from the series “Tramandare” by Adeline L. Riesenberger SLU...
05/08/2026

“Ravenna,” “Riomaggiore,” “Cortona,” “Assisi,” and “Firenze” from the series “Tramandare” by Adeline L. Riesenberger SLU ‘26 are part of the AAH SYE Exhibition “Whose kids are these?!,” which is on display at the Art Gallery until May 16, 2026.

These forms are inspired by ancient Roman pottery, the focus of my studies during my time abroad in Cortona, Italy, in the spring of 2025. My immersion into the country's rich cultural and artistic history truly connected me to the artists who lived, created, and left their mark long before me. The collection of vessels on display here is my contribution to the ever-expanding archive of human creativity. Standing on the backs of giants, I etch my memories into this timeline utilizing a medium that will outlive myself and generations to follow.

The nature of ceramics involves the duality of strength and fragility; these materials can survive for centuries and beyond. However, one wrong move and the vulnerability of the medium is exposed as the pot shatters into pieces. The frailty mimics my mortality and that of the artists before me, who evidently desired to preserve their legacy. The scale of these pots conveys a sense of grandeur, while their formal elements connect them to antiquity. This was the most appropriate "canvas" to display a glimpse of my cherished memories from time spent in some of the most beautiful cities in the world.

Creating functional ceramics allows for an intimate relationship between the vessel and the handler. As the creator, I put a lot of intention into shaping this relationship. I consider how the pot invites someone to interact with it, and how their hand will feel when they make contact. Is it smooth? Does it elicit comfort?

Are the ergonomics right? Additionally, I design the surface details to flow with the shape of the pot. I choose which scenes to draw on each pot based on its profile, curating a delicate balance in the composition. I like to envision an invisible string tied from my hands to those of the pot's eventual owner. Every step from a lump of clay to a finished pot requires profound attention and skill, as there is palpable risk of ruining the project at any moment. What I love about handmade ceramics is the indications of human touch. I do not aim to make these objects appear factory-produced. One can note the throwing lines from my fingers, see the perfect imperfections in the forms' symmetry, and appreciate the hand-carved signature on the bottom. In modernity, technology rapidly encroaches on people's lives, making many of us desperate for genuine social interaction. This handmade, intricate, and intentional art form provides a sense of human connection that is currently rare.
-Adeline L. Riesenberger

_________
Adeline Riesenberger is a double major in Psychology and Art & Art History and a member of the volleyball team. She grew up in Rochester, New York, always creating in various media, including drawing, painting, jewelry, printmaking, and ceramics. She takes inspiration from nostalgia, nature, and art history. Visit her website at www.alrcreative.weebly.com for more information.


“Over the Guardrail” by Luciana Postizzi SLU ‘26 is part of the AAH SYE Exhibition “Whose kids are these?!,” which is on...
05/07/2026

“Over the Guardrail” by Luciana Postizzi SLU ‘26 is part of the AAH SYE Exhibition “Whose kids are these?!,” which is on display at the Art Gallery until May 16, 2026.

Roadkill marks the limits of empathy in a culture trained to prioritize human urgency above all else. The animal did not choose the highway or the car, yet must bear the cost of both. This displacement reveals broader environmental injustice, in which nonhuman lives absorb the consequences of decisions beyond their reach. The roadside becomes a site where power, neglect, and vulnerability intersect.

Photographing roadkill is a form of environmental witnessing. To observe is to slow down, to refuse the comfort of advantage, to acknowledge that apathy is not neutrality. Roadkill is not merely an accident of vehicular transportation but a symptom of a larger cultural condition: a society moving too fast to care and too accustomed to loss to mourn. The dead bodies are pushed to the margins of the road, often in a place avoided by the driver’s eye. This physical displacement also enables moral distancing. If we do not look closely, you are spared the obligation to respond emotionally.

These photographs insist on proximity to discomfort, placing ecological consequence directly in view, asking whether human progress must always require sacrifice, and whose lives are deemed expendable in the process. It reflects action without consequence and loss without accountability. Apathy is not sudden but learned; it develops through the quiet normalization of harm.

Animals become expendable in the name of infrastructure. The road insists that such harm is unfortunate but necessary, that progress requires casualties, and that the road must remain clear, even if it means destroying what lies in its path. To look closely is to confront the ethics of indifference. The flattened animals on the highway become evidence of a broader cultural impulse: to keep moving forward before reckoning with what is left behind.
-Luciana Postizzi

__________
Luciana Postizzi is an Art & Art History/Studio Art and Anthropology double major. She enjoys being outdoors, spending time with the people she loves, and being deeply absorbed in her academic and creative work. Originally from central Massachusetts, she works in fiber arts and photography and finds inspiration in the beautiful nature of New England.

For more information about the exhibition, please click the link in our bio. Thank you.

“Swimming Pool,” “Alta Plaza Park,” “Sonoma County Fair,” and “Master Bedroom” by Rose Meihaus SLU ‘26 are part of the A...
05/06/2026

“Swimming Pool,” “Alta Plaza Park,” “Sonoma County Fair,” and “Master Bedroom” by Rose Meihaus SLU ‘26 are part of the AAH SYE Exhibition “Whose kids are these?!,” which is on display at the Art Gallery until May 16, 2026.

Blue is not only a color but a feeling-a feeling of emptiness, of a vast space taken up by a calm darkness. The blue shadows of life surround me. Rather than to the color itself, I am drawn to the feeling of shadow displayed on a bright canvas. Focusing on landscapes that portray people in motion, my paintings explore the relationship between the sun and shadows. The brightness of light versus the deep blue of a shadow drives my creative interests and leads me to experiment.

These contrasts come alive across three different scenes of summer in California. The first painting depicts a field trip to a swimming pool in June; the second, a scene from a park in San Fransico during May; and the third, photobooths at a local county fair in July. Together, all three explore light and the California landscape during the summer and are united by the sun’s manipulation of light and shadow.

When I paint, I hesitate to add figures because they become the main narrative of the painting. This semester, I challenged myself by incorporating figures into each scene. Although abstracted, the figures hold special connections to my life, while some are strangers. Adding the focal point of light and shadow creates an abstracted form rather than a perfectly rendered figure, allowing me to develop my skill without the pressure of perfect representation.

Each brushstroke invites a conversation, and I choose how to respond, letting the bright colors flow and breathe. My work reflects how I see my environment: not as a nature scene but as a snapshot of vivid form and color inspired by the golden California sun.
-Rose Meihaus

Rose Meihaus is an Art & Art History major. Born and raised in Santa Rosa, California, she works primarily in oil and watercolor. Her paintings derive inspiration from plein air landscapes and architecture. She grew up painting with her grandmother, Helen Macdonell, who was herself a watercolor artist, and credits her artistic abilities to her. Meihaus's work invokes memories of places and people that have come before, concentrating on color and abstraction.

For more information about the exhibition, please click the link in our bio. Thank you.

“Jesm O Rooh (body and soul)” by Sofia Zareizadeh SLU’26 is on display at the Art Gallery until May 16, 2026. This piece...
05/05/2026

“Jesm O Rooh (body and soul)” by Sofia Zareizadeh SLU’26 is on display at the Art Gallery until May 16, 2026.

This piece reflects the idea that we are each given a physical body without choice-our appearance, race, gender, and origin are not ours to decide. Yet within this body lives the soul, represented by the small silver figure, moving along its path through life.

The tree growing from the shoulder symbolizes how society and community shape who we become. At its top, the two lovers represent love and the ways it transforms and defines us. On the right, the house speaks to memory, nostalgia, and the idea of home. The candle lighting the path represents time, how, as it passes, things slowly reveal themselves and guide us closer to our inner self. The figure’s head holds both the sun and the moon, reflecting dualities within us: day and night, joy and sorrow, masculinity and femininity, all existing in a fluid balance. Finally, the colorful lake from which the figure emerges represents identity.
We are not made of a single color or definition, but of many layers, shifting, and intertwined.
-Sofia Zareizadeh

This exhibition explores identity, displacement, and the emotional contradictions of living between worlds. Rooted in my experience as an international student from Iran, these works navigate the tension between connection and separation, presence and absence, privilege and guilt.

Across the works in the exhibition, the human form becomes a vessel, carrying memory, longing, and inherited histories. Recurring elements, enclosed spaces, divided figures, and flowing lines reflect the fluid yet constrained nature of identity. The body is not presented as fixed, but as something shaped by culture, relationships, and time. Whether through reunion, separation, or transformation, each piece questions what it means to belong.

Ultimately, the exhibition does not seek resolution. Instead, it holds space for contradiction, where joy and sorrow, and connection and isolation coexist, inviting viewers to reflect on their own place within these shared human experiences.

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Canton, NY
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Tuesday 12pm - 8pm
Wednesday 12pm - 8pm
Thursday 12pm - 8pm
Friday 12pm - 5pm
Saturday 12pm - 5pm

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