2020 Beacon Gallery International Juried Show - Totems

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Totems

to·tem  /ˈtōdəm/

noun: totem; plural noun: totems

1. 1. a natural object or animal that is believed by a particular society to have spiritual significance and that is adopted by it as an emblem.

2. a person or thing regarded as being symbolic or representative of a particular quality or concept.

Since time immemorial spritiuality and symbolism has played an important role in the arts. The 2020 International Juried Show at Beacon Gallery called artists to take this concept of the "totem", an item that represents a symbol of a quality or concept (spiritual or not), and to submit artwork on this theme.

Three jurors, Lydia Gordon, of the Peabody Essex Museum, YoAhn Han a professional artist and professor at MassArt and Christine O'Donnell, owner of Beacon Gallery selected artworks by the artists from around the world listed below. They come from as close as Boston, MA and as far away as Zagreb, Croatia. 

The works were selected from almost 900 pieces submitted by approximately 250 artists, hailing from almost every state, Canada, as well as Europe. The spots in this exhibition were hard-won as the work submitted was excellent, and the jurors struggled to whittle down the works to what would fit in the gallery. The pieces range from miniscule to enormous and the media used demonstrate the multitudes of ways in which this theme can be interpreted. 

The 38 artists selected are as follows: 

Neville Barbour (Silver Spring, MD)
Jill Bell (Brooklyn, NY)
Douglas Bentham (Saskatoon, Canada) 
Undine Brod (Rhinebeck, NY)
Julie Cavaz (Sonoma, CA) 
Sammy Chong (West Roxbury, MA)
April Claggett (Dublin, NH) 
Harriett Cortez (New Orleans, LA)
Jim Creighton (Brunswick, ME)
Julia Csekö (Somerville, MA)
Mark Del Guidice (Concord, MA)
Sarah DePetris (Dallas, TX) 
Sean Dunstan-Halliday (Brookline, MA)
James Dye (Worcester, MA) 
Auguste Elder (New York, NY)
Susan Emmerson (Dorchester, MA) 
Leo Franco (Denver, CO) 
Herbert Friedson (Lawrence, KS) 
Nic Galloro (Havre de Grace, MD) 
Ronald Gonzalez (Johnson City, NY) 
Emma Hadzi Antich (Austin, TX) 
Helen Hierta (Greenbush, MI) 
Sarah J. Hull (Washington DC) 
Shana Kohnstamm (Bethesda, MD) 
Yael Kupiec-Dar (Sudbury, MA) 
Michael McLaughlin (Peabody, MA)
Ponnapa Prakkamakul (Cambridge, MA)
Brian Reeves (South Portland, ME) 
Kristina Rismondo (Zagreb, Croatia) 
Jiela Rufeh (Encinitas, CA) 
Erika Schwarz (Watertown, MA) 
Benjamin Sears (Granby, MA) 
Nicci Sevier-Vuyk (Katy, TX) 
Adrienne Shishko (Brookline, MA) 
Michael Spillers (Kansas City, MO) 
Fleur Thesmar (Belmont, MA) 
Rebecca McGee Tuck (Natick, MA)
Erin Zerbe (Marietta, OH) 

$1700 in prizes will be awarded at the opening: $100 for 3rd place in 2D/Digital work, $200 for 2nd place and $300 for 1st place; $100 for 3rd place in 3D/sculptural work, $200 for 2nd place and $300 for 1st place. Best in show: $500. 

About the Jurors

Lydia Gordon

Lydia Gordon is the associate curator for exhibitions and research at the Peabody Essex Museum in Salem, MA. Gordon is the coordinating curator for Hans Hofmann: The Nature of Abstraction and curator of Vanessa Platacis: Taking Place. Upcoming projects include Jacob Lawrence: The American Struggle, accompanied by the multi-author scholarly publication, featuring her essay “History Forward: Jacob Lawrence and Contemporary Art.” Gordon also serves as an adjunct professor of Modern Art History at Montserrat College of Art. She earned her BA in art administration from Simmons College in 2010 and her dual MA in art history, theory and criticism, art administration and policy from the School of the Art Institute of Chicago in 2017.  

YoAhn Han

YoAhn Han is a Korean painter based in Boston whose work is a visual dialogue between suppression and desire, a duality which speaks to both his experience of cerebral arteriovenous malformation and to his bifurcated cultural identity.  

He received his MFA 2D at Massachusetts College of Art and Design, and obtained a Bachelors of Fine Art from the School of the Art Institute of Chicago (SAIC). YoAhn's work has been shown internationally, in the United States, South Korea, and the Netherlands. Recent solo shows include "Metamorphic Desire" at Essex Art center (Jan, 2018), "My Princess, Bari" at ARTMORA Gallery in New York,  "Alluring Confinement" at the Artlery 160 in Boston, and 매혹적 가두어짐 (Enchanting Box) in Seoul, Korea. His work has also been exhibited in several group shows including "Summer Palette" at Chase Young Gallery in Boston, Seventh Juried Exhibition at Prince Street Gallery in New York, ART BLOSSM Exhibition at ARTMORA NJ, and Sanqtuary at Distillery Gallery in Boston.

Yo Ahn has also participated in the annual MassArt Auctions and the 2016 Busan international Art fair. 

Christine O'Donnell

Christine O'Donnell is the Owner and Gallery Manager of Beacon Gallery. Christine has juried many shows around the Boston area for galleries, art associations and museums.  

Christine is also a member of Newton, Massachusetts’s Cultural Council, which distributes overs $30,000 in grants annually. Christine has a master’s degree from Tufts University in Medford, Massachusetts and a bachelor’s degree from College of the Holy Cross in Worcester, Massachusetts.