With works ranging from decomposing sculptures to lenticular prints and origami, Dittmar Memorial Gallery opened its doors to its community show “Metamorphosis: The Art of Transformation” Thursday.
Each year, Dittmar invites community members to submit their artwork to the community show under a specific theme. The 2025 theme is metamorphosis, encouraging artists to create pieces using varied media to tell stories of change, evolution and transformation.
“The laws of physics state that matter cannot be created or destroyed. Therefore, all artistic media — paints, fabrics, papers — have gone through a process of metamorphosis to unite as a finished work of art,” Dittmar Gallery said in a statement about the exhibit.
Weinberg sophomore Elyse Malamud and Communication sophomore Gabby Gutierrez curated “Metamorphosis.” As they crafted the exhibition, the two said they explored the question of how the evolution of art can reflect the world and humanity.
According to Malamud, the show features 32 different works by 33 different community and student artists.
Kellogg MBA candidate Emma Shi is exhibiting her work “Essence,” a series of pen-on-paper drawings Shi said she created during the pandemic, as a part of the show. When she took walks to stay calm, Shi said she would create drawings based on what she saw.
“I think that by capturing these (scenes) down on paper, it’s kind of transforming them into a way that they stay longer,” Shi said. “We can remember the scenes. That’s the art of transformation.”
Evanston resident Anne Hughes is also showcasing her work in the show, a large pastel piece “Inextricably Bound.”
Hughes said the piece itself was a metamorphosis because it changed as she progressed through the creation process. Even after she thought it was done and framed, Hughes saw new places to rework the piece, she said.
“I never have an idea of exactly what something’s going to look like. My art is always a journey. The process, it’s almost like meditation,” Hughes said. “Sometimes I might start with an image or just put color down and then I will turn my paper in different directions and keep working until something is starting to grab me.”
School of the Art Institute of Chicago alum Richard Gessert took a different angle on the “Metamorphosis” theme. He created three lenticular prints based on photographs he took of an Oxalis plant that he said looked like a butterfly.
The plant opens in the morning and closes at night, which he felt mimicked the natural flutter of butterfly wings. His work “leippya lepidoptera papilionacea (butterfly-soul-butterfly-butterfly)” explores the idea of one thing looking like another, he said.
“There were some ideas there about something transient, transformative or impermanent about the butterfly and its fragility,” Gessert said. “Because the plant usually responds to stimuli, these prints shift as the viewer walks past them, so the viewer becomes the stimulus that causes the shift.”
Living four blocks from the gallery, Virginia O. Roeder has participated in the community show at Dittmar for the past four years.
On top of loving the community aspect of the exhibition, Roeder said she enjoys working with student curators and creating art for each theme.
“I like the challenge. Last year, the theme was to do an artwork which was based on some kind of poetry poem, and that was an interesting challenge for me,” Roeder said. “After going through that process, it’s fun then to look at the display and to see how other people interpret that theme.”
“Metamorphosis” will remain open for viewing in Dittmar until March 10, offering commentary on the intersection of life and art.
Correction: A previous version of this story misquoted Gessert. The Daily regrets the error.
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