Works by
Robert Loebell
Rob Millard
Susanne Tierney

October 16 – November 7, 2003

Plato’s use of the literary device of the divided line to separate the intelligible world and the visible world laid a frame work that placed images and imagination at the very bottom of the ladder, at the lowest level of knowledge and inured a legacy of doubt that the world of the senses could not be trusted and that knowledge of things/objects could only be understood on intellectual terms. This division segregated ordinary visible objects from their shadows, reflections or other representations. Does art exist as idea or is idea made present in tangible materials?

Robert Loebell’s impetus to create springs from a desire to explore the physical world and he looks to science, literature, current events or other art as the foundation for his work. He acknowledges though that there is an additional force at play in the creation of his pieces: the nature of the material itself. He says that using wood as a medium “sets its own time frame and insists on its own presence as a partner in the final piece.” An uneasy play develops in this process and Loebell’s manipulation tries to defy that pre-knowledge of the nature of the material. On the other hand, Rob Millard looks squarely at recurring archetypes in an effort to remold or rethink his relationships to things in the world and asks us to reconsider our own actions in response to the ideas we involve ourselves with. His work plays upon our desire to know and our desire to change the objects we encounter. Millard wants to engage the viewer on a number of levels; visually, physically and intellectually. Susanne Tierney seeks to connect the idea of thought with the practice of mark making and ancient language systems. She speaks about unearthing mythology but in her work she tries to define the act of creation that occurs on the liminal plane, one caught between the physical world, the world of objects, and to trust the world of thought, and creation.

Connecticut sculptor Rob Loebell received his B.F.A. from Tyler School of Art and an M.F.A. from Temple University. Recent Solo exhibitions include Altered Pieces, Silvermine Gallery, New Canaan, CT; Gift of Chaos, Pump House Gallery, Hartford, CT. Group exhibitions include Rebuilding Torn Societies, United Nations, NY; Fire and Ice, Attleboro Museum, Attleboro, MA; and Sculpture Takes Over, Rockland Center for the Arts, Rockland, NY. The Connecticut Art Education Association named him the Connecticut Secondary Art Teacher of Year for 2001-2002. He is also a recipient of a Fellowship Grant from the Greater Hartford Arts Council and a Roberts Foundation Award from Artworks Gallery, New Haven, CT.

Rob Millard received his B.F.A. from UMASS, graduating summa cum laude, and an M.F.A. in Sculpture from UMASS Dartmouth. Currently he is a Full-Time Lecturer at Northeastern University in Drawing, 2-D and 3-D Design. Recent exhibitions include a group show Art Aspire Exhibition at the Fuller Museum of Art in Brockton, MA; Playland and Home-Made at The Revolving Museum, Lowell, MA; and I See London, I See France at the A.R.C. Gallery, Chicago, IL. His work is also included in a number of permanent collections including Appalachian Center for Crafts; Georgia Southern University, Statesboro, GA and Westport Wineries, Westport, MA.

Susanne Tierney received her B.F.A. form Rhode Island College and an M.F.A. from the University of Connecticut. Recent exhibitions include Spring Group Show, Pleiades Gallery, New York, NY; Summer Small Works Invitational 2002, Limner Gallery, New York, NY; LUC Print Biennial Print Exhibition, Loyola University, Chicago, IL; and Annual, Berkley Art Center, Berkley, CA. She is currently lecturing at Salve Regina University, Newport, RI and teaching at Rhode Island College, Providence, RI. Her work is permanent collections at the Bank of Rhode Island, Cromwell Corporation, Pawtucket, RI and Sojourner House, Providence, RI.