Beth Krensky, a Jewish-American artist, describes herself as “a gatherer of things—objects, words, spirit—and a connector of fragments to make us whole.”
The exhibition Gathering Light holds a space to honor the emptiness left by the loss of over 1.5 million children who perished in the Holocaust and provides an opportunity for collective reflection. Krensky’s artistic practice traverses the borderlands between spirit and matter as she creates objects and performative gestures as a contemplative act with the intention to metaphorically cross layers of shared and contested existence.
Rooted in a socio-historical memory of place, Krensky addresses pressing issues while providing a refuge—a free space—that allows participants to name themselves, envision a different reality, and engage in the re-making of their world. In this exhibition, she gathers light from unexpected places, including darkness. Her performance stills and delicately crafted objects provide openings for contemplating the hollows of loss and envisioning renewal.
This exhibition was curated by Granary Arts in partnership with Americans and the Holocaust: A Traveling Exhibition for Libraries, an educational initiative of the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum and the American Library Association, hosted by Snow College Karen H. Huntsman Library from September 4 through October 11, 2023. For more information, visit www.snow.edu/library/.
About the Artist
Beth Krensky is Area Head and Professor of Art Teaching at the University of Utah. She received her formal art training from the School of the Museum of Fine Arts at Tufts University and MIT’s Center for Advanced Visual Studies. She holds an M.Ed. from the Harvard Graduate School of Education and a Ph.D. in Educational Foundations from the University of Colorado at Boulder. She is also a scholar of youth-created art for social change. Her writing addresses community-based art education, youth activist art, and art for social change. Krensky’s work has been exhibited widely throughout the United States and internationally. She is a founding member of the international artist collective, the Artnauts, and is a Fellow with the Jewish Art Salon in New York City. In 2022, she was selected as one of five performance art finalists for the 16th Arte Laguna Prize and Yale University exhibited a 20-year retrospective of her art. bethkrensky.com
Event is free and open to the public.