2018 & 2019 Master of Fine Arts candidates present “The Very Best Deserts on Planet Earth” in the School of Art’s annual First and Second Year MFA exhibition. “The Very Best Deserts” showcases new work by a diverse group of eleven emerging artists working in a range of methodologies, conceptual frameworks, and media. For gallery hours and more about the exhibition, visit theverybestdeserts.info.

On view April 2 – April 23, 2017
Soft Opening: Sunday, April 2, 3-5pm
Closing Party: Friday, April 21, 5:30–10pm in conjunction with the Cultural Trust’s monthly Gallery Crawl
Pittsburgh Cultural Trust’s 937 Gallery
937 Penn Ave, Pittsburgh PA, 15222

About the Artists

Shobun Baile revives design histories and buried institutions.
Katie Rose Pipkin produces printed material as books, as well as digital work in software, bots, and games. They also make drawings by hand, on paper.
Nick Crockett makes games with bodies.
Gray Swartzel works collaboratively with an artist he found through craigslist who serves as his surrogate mother. The documentation of their constructed mother/child exchange investigates biopolitics and the state of global currency in regard to the degradation of the patriarchal order.
Paper Buck utilizes interdisciplinary approaches to traditional visual art mediums to critically engage contemporary social movement discourses, investigate the intersections of familial and national mythologies, and make visible the perpetuities of colonial processes within neoliberal capitalism.
Erin Mallea is currently advocating for the ethical memorialization and representation of a local oak tree.
Jisoo Yeo renders floors floorless by focusing on the idea of the impermanence of time-space.
Joy Poulard Cruz fuses pop-cultural, Afro-Caribbean and Western mythologies to cultivate unity between the familiar and unfamiliar.
Alex Lukas examines the quasi-sacral figure within a secular, souvenir-centric society.
Lee Webster makes work on American mourning and the perpetual pop-culture nostalgia machine.
Shohei Katayama explores the relationship between nature, technology, and the scientific forces that shape the human experience.