Department of Art Events

New work by Jonathan Wallace.

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*Note: UO ID card with building access is required to gain entry to Washburn Gallery.*

New work by Margaret Scully 

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Map to location of Foyer Gallery in Lawrence Hall

inter/exter is an exhibition of collaborative explorations on the possible interactions between art forms and media of expression. The work was created during the Fall of 2025 in a section of Issues and Practices under the enlightened tutelage of Colin Ives. 

Participating Artists:

Candice Francis - Kylie Kramer - Erin Hamilton - Mage Chadowitz - Grace Frangente - Zoe Maitland - Omar Khouri - Maeve Cier - Sophie Parker - Dew Mirihana Arachchilage - Gabe Sames - Geordi Helmick - Andrew Hunter  - Nikolas Martinez - Aaron McGlade     

Learn Jacquard silk weaving and design at the Foundation Lisio in Florence, Italy, through the Fiber Arts in Florence program! Explore fabric and fibers analysis and learn how to identify complex  weave structures like brocade, damask, lampas, liseré, and velvet. On site, you will observe master silkweavers at their looms, engaged in the product design process.

Presented by the Center for Art Research The Whisperers January 17- February 15, 2026 curated by Tannaz Farsi and Simone Ciglia

Saturday, January 17 Curator walkthrough from 4:30-5:00 p.m. Opening reception from 5:00- 7:00 p.m.

Gallery Hours: Saturdays & Sundays from noon- 4:00 p.m. and by appointment Location: Ditch Projects, 303 S 5th St #165, Springfield, OR 97477

To whisper is to hold words in the mouth, away from the vocal cords, letting them rumble, mutter, whistle or hiss out into the world, often into the ear of another, intent on receiving. This act is sometimes seen as clandestine; a private form of communication intended to incite and arouse rebellion. In this exhibition, we see its potential for arousal as a means of creation: to establish networks of tangential affinities, to parallel multiple modes of artistic and curatorial practice that can expand the potential for historical recovery, and to acknowledge longstanding systems of oppression by engaging practices that assert their own terms of representing subjecthood and empowering sovereignty.   

We began the idea for this exhibition by gathering artworks that initiate forms of address through traces of past events in existing archives or document singular moments that necessitate the creation of new archives. This methodology, one that the art historian Hal Foster observed within art practice at the turn of this century, links current contemporary works to early 20th century during which time artists began to unveil the symbolic and, subsequently, the semiotic conditions of objects and images produced, manufactured or advertised within the public sphere. 

Following their own archival impulses, the artists in this exhibition have developed practices centered on searching, gathering and instituting connections. They research existing archives, retrieving different typologies of information to reconfigure in their artworks. In this process, they interrogate the institution of organized historical collecting by shedding light on its biases, amnesias, and oversights.

This exhibition is made possible by the University of Oregon Department of Art’s Center for Art Research and the Ford Family Foundation. 

The University of Oregon Department of Art is pleased to present a lecture and exhibition by Reza Safavi (MFA ’06), made possible by the LaVerne Krause Lectures and Exhibitions endowment.  

The exhibition "Binging on the Biome" will be on view from Febraury 16-26, 2026 in the LaVerne Krause Gallery. An exhibition reception will immediately following the lecture.

"Binging on the Biome" is informed by an interest in the edge zones of ecosystems, transitional regions where distinct environments meet and interact. These liminal spaces are defined by exchange, instability, and heightened activity, operating under conditions of continual negotiation rather than equilibrium. Through light-based works, scanned and printed ice forms, film, fabric, and kinetic systems, the works highlight these areas where environmental systems overlap and remain in flux. Referencing the increasing scarcity of ice, the exhibition considers how regions once defined by inaccessibility are becoming sites of strategic interest and control. The exhibition remains open-ended, resisting resolution while acknowledging the complexities of engagement with fragile systems.

Reza Safavi’s practice is shaped by a hybrid sense of identity. Raised in Canada after the Multiculturalism Act of 1988, he explores cultural juxtapositions through material and digital forms. Living and working in the U.S., he continues this inquiry through research and practice. Reza has been a member of several artists’ groups and, in addition to his solo work, he regularly participates in making of collaborative projects. His artwork has been exhibited and presented regionally nationally and internationally in diverse venues ranging from galleries and museums to public installations and performances. He is Professor of Art at Washington State University and holds an MFA from the University of Oregon (2006) and a BFA from the University of Victoria, in Victoria, BC, Canada. 

Image caption: Komagataeibacterberg, fabricated from point cloud data from an Arctic iceberg using a custom biomaterial made from oceanic microbes and Kombucha, Archival Pigment Print

University of Oregon 2025-26 Visiting Artist Lecture Series Presented by the Department of Art and Center for Art Research

The lecture will be followed by an exhibition reception for Reza Safavi in the Laverne Krause Gallery.

Reza Safavi’s research examines how technology shapes experience. He uses sculpture, video, game engines, light, sound, drawing, performance, analog and digital devices as well as elements of the natural world to create interactive experiences that highlight the interfaces, both macro and micro, among communities, technology, consciousness and the environment. Receiving his MFA from the UO in 2006, Reza is thrilled to return to give a talk on his work and where he has been for the last 20 years.

Reza Safavi’s practice is shaped by a hybrid sense of identity. Raised in Canada after the Multiculturalism Act of 1988, he explores cultural juxtapositions through material and digital forms. Living and working in the U.S., he continues this inquiry through research and practice. Reza has been a member of several artists’ groups and, in addition to his solo work, he regularly participates in making of collaborative projects. His artwork has been exhibited and presented regionally nationally and internationally in diverse venues ranging from galleries and museums to public installations and performances. He is Professor of Art at Washington State University and holds an MFA from the University of Oregon (2006) and a BFA from the University of Victoria, in Victoria, BC, Canada.

This lecture and exhibition are made possible by the Laverne Krause Lectures and Exhibitions endowment.   

Reception immediately following the lecture.

The University of Oregon Department of Art is pleased to present a lecture and exhibition by Reza Safavi (MFA ’06), made possible by the LaVerne Krause Lectures and Exhibitions endowment.  

Binging on the Biome is informed by an interest in the edge zones of ecosystems, transitional regions where distinct environments meet and interact. These liminal spaces are defined by exchange, instability, and heightened activity, operating under conditions of continual negotiation rather than equilibrium. Through light-based works, scanned and printed ice forms, film, fabric, and kinetic systems, the works highlight these areas where environmental systems overlap and remain in flux. Referencing the increasing scarcity of ice, the exhibition considers how regions once defined by inaccessibility are becoming sites of strategic interest and control. The exhibition remains open-ended, resisting resolution while acknowledging the complexities of engagement with fragile systems.

Reza Safavi’s practice is shaped by a hybrid sense of identity. Raised in Canada after the Multiculturalism Act of 1988, he explores cultural juxtapositions through material and digital forms. Living and working in the U.S., he continues this inquiry through research and practice. Reza has been a member of several artists’ groups and, in addition to his solo work, he regularly participates in making of collaborative projects. His artwork has been exhibited and presented regionally nationally and internationally in diverse venues ranging from galleries and museums to public installations and performances. He is Professor of Art at Washington State University and holds an MFA from the University of Oregon (2006) and a BFA from the University of Victoria, in Victoria, BC, Canada. 

Image caption: Komagataeibacterberg, fabricated from point cloud data from an Arctic iceberg using a custom biomaterial made from oceanic microbes and Kombucha, Archival Pigment Print

University of Oregon 2025-26 Visiting Artist Lecture Series Presented by the Department of Art and Center for Art Research

“Weights & Measures” conveys multiple meanings. It refers to the burdens our bodies and psyches carry, the passage of time and musical tempos. At its most literal, it evokes systems of value and order. The talk will discuss Khoury’s last three years of work that that have focused on collectivity, intangibility, music, food, athleticism, and death.  Through the process of assemblage, casting, printmaking, forging, welding, and hand building forms, Khoury continues to explore what makes something, or someone, worth more or less than another? The athleticism of death, the aestheticism of the everyday, and the cultural imperatives that create the weights we bear. The talk will share the unique processes of casting at the Kohler Factory in Wisconsin two summers in a row, first in foundry and then in pottery.

Sahar Khoury is an artist based in Oakland, California.  Khoury makes sculptures that integrate abstraction, personal and political symbols, and an intuitive sensitivity to site. Found or rejected objects that are immediate, abundant, and recurring serve as a script for constructions made of metal, clay, cement, and papier-mâché. Trained as a cultural anthropologist and having never taken any fundamental art classes, Khoury continues to develop an idiosyncratic approach to merging diverse materials, with a primary commitment to spontaneity and interdependence. She received her BA in Anthropology from UC Santa Cruz in 1996 and her MFA From UC Berkeley in 2013.