Current Exhibitions

October 8 – December 18, 2021
Sara May Love Gallery

Women Artists: Four Centuries of Creativity presents etchings, engravings, lithographs, drawings, watercolors, and photographs – by some of the most important women artists of the last four centuries, all from the collection of the Reading Public Museum.

Included in the exhibition are historical works by some of the great women artists including Rosa Bonheur, Sonia Delaunay, Joan Mitchell, Louise Nevelson, Françoise Gilot, Clara Skinner, Lorna Simpson, and dozens more. The exhibition chronicles the emergence of women as professionals in the field of art and records the extraordinary creative contributions made over the centuries.

Image: Violet Oakley (American, 1874 – 1961), For the Preservation of Italy, Guardian of the World’s Most Precious Heritage of Beauty, 1918, ink on paper, Gift, Captain Roswell C. Williams Jr. Reading Public Museum, Reading, Pennsylvania.

Visit the Exhibition Page for programming, images, and more!

A.C.Q. – Cross Eyed; A.C.Q. – Cross Ban; A.C.Q. – Cross Waves, 2016-2017, refrigerator parts and nylon pantyhose, left element 27 x 20 in., center element 35 x 45 in., right element 43 x 30 in. From the Collection of Art Bridges

October 8 - December 18, 2021
Sarah K. Newberry Gallery

Gadsden Arts is pleased to share Senga Nengudi’s multi-part A.C.Q (Air Conditioning Queen) sculpture, constructed from found metal refrigerator parts and nylon panty house, from the esteemed collection of Art Bridges. In the 1970s, Nengudi became a leading force within the emerging community of Black artists and musicians who work challenges and reimagines the traditional narratives of Post-Minimalism and Conceptual art, while reframing the broader histories of both feminism and the Black Power Movement. She has always used a variety of natural and unconventional materials to fashion her works, and her interest in visual arts, dance, body mechanics, and matters of the spirit still play out in ever changing ways in her art. Image courtesy Art Bridges.

October 8 - December 18, 2021
Zoe Golloway Gallery

Renee Schwardron Lewis works in oil crayons, color pencils, and pastels to produce bold, stunning colors and uses creative themes to capture the nature of women. At the core of her work are women - empowered, strong - yet vulnerable - linked to others, each other - and beautiful from within. The repetitive patterns, decorative motifs, and bold color in her work reflect Lewis’s background in fabric design.

Art Talk Live! with Renee Lewis

Thursday December 2, 1:00pm on Zoom
Join Gadsden Arts Staff and Renee Schwadron Lewis for a virtual Art Talk Live to discuss her art making process and decades long artistic career. Lewis will discuss her Post-Impressionist style drawings display in the Zoe Golloway Gallery this fall, and reflect on her use of a combination oil crayons, colored pencils, and pastels to capture the colorful nature of women. Register for this Art Talk Live!      

September 11 - December 11, 2021
Munroe Family Community Gallery
Dawn McMillan moves away from past figurative and narrative paintings and drawings to explore in this new work landscapes centered on fleeting moments of light and circumstance. Whether it’s the sunset after a storm that bathes everything in a golden glow, or the stillness of deep, dark reflections on a pond at twilight, all scenes are meant to evoke a feeling of peace, serenity and awe. This series of paintings and drawings began at the start of the pandemic and continued throughout a year of isolation and a time of focus on nature and the briefness of a perfectly lit scene. Shadows cast on a clapboard house; bare tree silhouettes against a pale, pastel winter sky; brilliant reds and oranges of a crisp autumn day; the light at the end of a rhododendron tunnel; all are translations of exploration of nature by the artist and meant to be evocative, timeless and everlasting. Image: Dawn McMillan, Bear Creek Ravine, pastel.