In Our Time brings together eighteen UF art faculty whose latest artworks express life in this region, this country, this planet, in 2024 through clay, paint, graphite, video AI, photography, sound, fiber, collage and writing. As conjurors and influencers, they’ve created fantastical and provocative visions and histories that deepen our awareness of what it means to be together in this time.
The exhibition title comes from two sources, a 1925 collection of stories by Ernest Hemingway about WWI’s desolate, reactive aftermath. Hemingway in turn borrowed it from a phrase in a 16th century Book of Common Prayer, “Give peace in our time, O Lord.” It seems a fitting title for where we are today.
In the third decade of the 21st century, this celebratory exhibition of UF’s Art and Art History Faculty is replete with complexity since we are living through unprecedented times: a post-pandemic, global-warming, pre-election, Anthropocene era that consumes our attention as it sidetracks our peace-of-mind. The power of art is that it can expand minds, connect hearts, focus the future and steady nerves in knowing we’re all in this together. Either we win or learn.
This exhibition is made possible with support from Visit Gainesville, Alachua County; the Harn Annual Fund and other generous donors.