“Mandala”, digital artwork by Kate Quinn Sibole. Photo submitted
FARMINGTON—UMF Art Gallery is pleased to open the 2022-2023 season with “Mandala” and “Push Pull Place”, exhibitions of new and ongoing digital works by Kate Quinn Sibole. The exhibit will be on view at the University of Maine Gallery in Farmington from September 1 through October 8, 2022, with an opening reception on Thursday, September 1 from 5-7 p.m. The exhibition is free and open to the public.
In Mandala, Sibole explores the symbol of the universe in an ideal form, the process of creating form signifying the transformation of suffering and worry into joy and beauty. Working on these “digital meditations” on and off for over 10 years, Sibole’s practice with them has resurfaced in a more intentional way in 2020.
Mandalas have become his almost daily meditation. They are a way to center and ground one’s presence in times when nothing else seems balanced or tenable. Even as a quest for wholeness and self-unity, they are still elusive. The back and forth of the digital format yields infinitesimal results. So on, the process develops. For will we ever be complete?
“Push Pull Place”, digital artwork by Kate Quinn Sibole Photo submitted
In a new body of work based in the Maine landscape, Push Pull Place, Sibole draws inspiration from the words of poet Victoria Erickson:
“Listen to the night as the night knows your truths, your stories, your ills, your dreams, your desires, your forgotten memories; not so forgotten.
This series of photographs is the slow rolling of the artist to the confines of memory. She asks, can we fully enter a beautiful place thanks to the warm sun, the tender waves and the grounding earth? Do we bring with us the layers of worry, imbalance and fear? You can’t have one without the other. It’s overwhelming frustration – pushing without pulling?
Tomorrow mingles with today and with all the yesterdays that have passed before or are to come. How can an image ever sit with only one version of time and place? Memory, grief, love…these are doors. A door is neither of the rooms it connects. And yet, it’s not his own room at all.
Kate Sibole received her MFA in Photography and Animation from the School of Visual Arts in New York. Since 1999, she has been a professor and chair of the Department of Communications and New Media Studies at Southern Maine Community College. She is also a mother, cat trainer, beekeeper and chaos gardener.
The UMF Art Gallery is dedicated to bringing contemporary art to campus and regional communities. The gallery is located at 246 Main Street, behind the admissions office. Gallery hours are Tuesday through Sunday, 12 p.m. to 4 p.m. and by appointment. Please contact Sarah at [email protected] or 778-1062 for more information or to make an appointment.
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