Be, Held offers a look at the wide range of contemporary art using analog processes that are being created today, with a Midwestern twist, for generation after generation to enjoy.
The University of Southern Indiana New Harmony Gallery of Contemporary Art (NHGCA) is pleased to present Be, Held: Contemporary Analog Art by Johanna Aenderl, Jenny Zoey Casey and Rachel Singel. The exhibit opens Saturday, September 12 with an opening reception from 3 to 5 p.m. The exhibit will run through October 31.
This multidimensional exhibit features handmade artworks ranging from fiber art, mixed media sculpture and works on paper shaped by artists with links to Minnesota, Illinois and Kentucky. Emphasizing the labor-intensive nature of contemporary handmade artworks, artists in Be, Held sustain practices frequently in dialogue with traditional American pioneer vernacular and folk traditions. Whether drawing inspiration from Upper Midwest quilting traditions, reclaiming textiles destined for landfills in Illinois or building paper pulp from invasive weeds dotting northern Kentucky landscapes, works on view build a dialogue with the existing lexicon of enduring, physical art-making practices while presaging where these processes are headed moving into the 21st century.
Prints, artist books, mixed-media sculpture and textile works infuse the exhibit with a wide range of artistic sensibilities and methodologies. Throughout, the exhibit leaves room for the viewer to make new connections between disparate aspects of contemporary material culture.
Be, Held offers a look at the wide range of contemporary art using analog processes that are being created today, with a Midwestern twist, for generation after generation to enjoy. Visit the Gallery website for programming details: usi.edu/nhgallery
Johanna Aenderl Ryan was born and raised in Minnesota and is currently based in Brooklyn, New York. She received her Master of Fine Arts from the New York Academy of Art in 2020. She has been a recipient of grants and scholarships through Penland School of Craft (2023), Brooklyn Arts Council SU-CASA (2023), and the New York Academy of Art (2017-2020). Her most recent solo exhibition took place at ChaShama, New York. She also previously co-curated “Interwoven Perception” at The Stairwell Space. Select group exhibitions include Ethan Cohen KuBE, Brooklyn Waterfront Artist Coalition, Equity Gallery and Cape Cod Museum of Art. She has been an artist-in-residence at Voice x NYAA, ChaNorth and Virginia Center for Creative Arts (VCCA).
Jenny Zoey Casey is an artist working in dyed and painted fabric collage. Raised in a working-class neighborhood in Oahu, Hawaii, Casey holds a Bachelor of Fine Arts from California College of Arts and Crafts and a Master of Arts in Art History from the University of Washington. The artist relocated to New York City from Illinois in 2025, exhibiting at CHART gallery that year after completing residencies at the Vermont Studio Center and the Oxbow School of Art. The artist received an Illinois Arts Council grant while working on the body of work on view in Be, Held. Casey has contributed writing to “Two Coats of Paint,” a renowned arts publication focused on painting practices.
Rachel Singel is Associate Professor and Head of the Printmaking Area at the University of Louisville. Singel grew up on a small farm in Charlottesville, Virginia. She received a Bachelor of Arts from the University of Virginia in 2009 and a Master of Fine Arts in Printmaking from the University of Iowa in 2013. She has participated in residencies at the Penland School of Crafts; the Venice Printmaking Studio; Internazionale di Grafica Venezia; Art Print Residence in Barcelona, Spain; Wharepuke Print Studios in New Zealand; Proyecto’ace, an Artist-in-Residence Program in Buenos Aires, Argentina; AGA Lab in the Netherlands; and the Spring Creek Project at Oregon State University for a long-term ecological reflections residency in Blue River, Oregon. She has studied non-toxic printmaking at the Grafisk Eksperimentarium studio in Andalusia and recently traveled to Japan to research papermaking with invasive plants. Her work has been exhibited nationally and internationally and represented in private collections and public institutions.
NHGCA at the University of Southern Indiana promotes discourse about and access to contemporary art in the southern Indiana region. The NHGCA is a proud outreach partner of Historic New Harmony with the University of Southern Indiana. The gallery is located at 506 Main Street in New Harmony, Indiana. Regular hours are 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. Tuesday through Saturday. For more information, visit the NHGCA website or call 812-682-3156.
This exhibition is made possible in part by the Efroymson Family Fund, Evansville Public Library’s The Arts at EVPL and the Indiana Arts Commission, which receives support from the State of Indiana and the National Endowment for the Arts.