Inaugural Exhibition, Burchfield Penney Art Center

The Burchfield Penney Art Center's Inaugural Exhibitions premiering on November 21, 2008 included the new Collection Study Area. This space was designed for Buffalo State College students, faculty, scholars, and visitors to scrutinize artworks from our collection more closely. Modeled after collection study spaces at university art museums, this room had special thematic displays allowing visitors to explore and conduct research on aspects of our collection from multi-disciplinary viewpoints. Requests to study specific works were granted to the Buffalo State College campus community, including Burchfield Penney Art Center staff. The inaugural exhibition contained archival materials to provide a better understanding of Charles E. Burchfield, Paul Sharits, and Milton Rogovin, whose work was presented throughout the museum. Exhibited artworks included a Burchfield watercolor and doodle. Burchfield wrote about his doodles as “drawings of a sort.  In my case, doodling is a free exercise in abstraction, unpremeditated, and not a conscious expression, since it is done at the time of some other activity.” Laura Snyder's Untitled from the series, Veiled Dissections, welcomed visitors into the room by its stunning scale. Future exhibitions were to be arranged by Kathy Gaye Shiroki, Curator of Museum Learning and Community Engagement with assistance from Nancy Weekly, Head of Collections and the Charles Cary Rumsey Curator, and Scott Propeack, Collections and Traveling Exhibitions Manager, based on requests made by Buffalo State College faculty.

Works by Endi Poskovic and Roland Wise were viewable through the glass wall of the office suite reception space. Collection artworks were shown throughout the building in other non-gallery spaces.