The Community Arts Gallery will present MFA Thesis Exhibition II: Ericia Bartels, Carol Tomasso, and Darcie Trame from Friday, February 29 through Friday, April 4, 2008. At the completion of their Master of Fine Arts degree programs at Wayne State University (WSU), Bartels, Tomasso, and Trame exhibit work that serves as a summation of their graduate experiences. Their insightful and finely crafted works illustrate why Wayne is considered as one of the top fine arts graduate programs in Michigan.

Carol Tomasso, a native of Detroit, started her undergraduate work on scholarship at the Columbus College of Art and Design in Columbus, Ohio. A few years later Tomasso returned to Michigan, and completed her undergraduate studies with a Bachelors degree in Fine Art at Wayne State University in Detroit. Tomasso has taught at summer camp, and at WSU as an adjunct metals teacher. During that time period, the experience that most influenced her was the workshop: “Arts on the Lake” with Heiki Seppa. Tomasso’s enthusiasm for hollow-ware helped her garner scholarships at WSU, as well as acceptance to the national juried exhibition Aesthetics ’98, presented at the Birger Sandszen Memorial Gallery in Lindsborg, Kansas. Tomasso’s work was also included in “The S.O.F.A. Exhibit” through the Yaw Gallery in Birmingham, Michigan.

Three years after graduation Tomasso worked in bench repair, after which she put her own studio together and decided to further her development as a metalsmith. Currently, the artist is finishing her MFA degree at Wayne State University. Tomasso’s work has been included in exhibitions at Cranbrook’s Forum Gallery, Ann Arbor Art Center, Ellen Kayrod Gallery, Eastern Michigan University, Detroit Contemporary, and Yaw Gallery (Birmingham, MI).

Ericia Bartels (www.ericiab.com) says of her work, “Metal mirrors my urban life. Its sleek surface gleams a cold sheen over the hard mass, a result of soulful repetitive motion. I enjoy working beside my city. Its pulse surrounds me as I transform chaos into structure, sometimes structure into chaos. I submit to the arduous, sustained cadence of its urban hum. Creativity is not enough; like Detroit, metal requires patience, diligence and honest criticism of one’s actions. I respond to that. It’s where I come from. Though it is my hope that each piece projects my personality and love for the city, I invite the viewer to share the mere visual pleasure in each form. As my voice matures, I find the need to incorporate relevant issues from the present social construct, again melding with what goes on outside my studio windows.”

Bartels was born in Chicago and raised in Detroit. She received her undergraduate degree from the College for Creative Studies in Detroit, and is completing her MFA degree at Wayne State University in Detroit, where she has served as a Teaching Assistant. Her work has been included in exhibitions at the Detroit Artists Market, Ann Arbor Art Association and Cranbrook’s Forum Gallery, among others. Bartels was the recipient of awards from the Ann Arbor Art Fair, College for Creative Studies, and the DaimlerChrysler Global Supplier Award Competition. Bartels currently resides in Detroit.

Darcie Trame received her BFA from the University of Toledo in 2004, and is working towards completion of her MFA at Wayne State in Detroit, Michigan. She is currently an artist-in-residence at the Collingwood Arts Center in Toledo, Ohio. Darcie has shown at various galleries and group exhibitions. Her recent work explores the logical side of chaos as defined and expressed through chaos theory.

About her life and work, Trame says, “While at a library in the spring of nineteen-ninety-four, I came across a book on chaos theory. Due to having an aptitude for mathematics, my interest was piqued and I began to read the book, which in turn led to a steady stream of books on the subject that I read with insatiability. What interested me was the concept of chaos as a branch of order, for my life has always been a jumble of unpredictability and disorder; a chaotic assemblage of random events. Now it seemed there was a predictability and logic to it. This knowledge combined with synesthesia began to form a sort of visual clue to the ordered pattern of events that I once saw as unrelated, colors and codes laid out in a visual symbolism that unfolds before me each time I experience the system, thus giving rise to the work that I have embarked upon.”

The opening reception is on Friday, February 29, from 5:00 to 8:00 PM, and is free and open to the general public. Community Arts Gallery is located in the Community Arts Building at 450 Reuther Mall, near Cass and Kirby.