“Watson and the Shark”By Katie Pumphrey
Washington College’s Kohl Gallery is excited to open our 2024/25 season with Freestyle, an exhibition of recent works by Brandon Donahue-Shipp and Katie Pumphrey. Freestyle will be on view at Kohl Gallery in Washington College’s Gibson Center for the Arts from September 13 to October 19. The artists will speak in a moderated public conversation led by new Kohl director Rob Blackson on Friday, September 13 beginning at 4:30 p.m. A public catered reception celebrating the exhibition will immediately follow the artists’ conversation.
Freestyle was conceived by former Kohl director Tara Gladden. Artistry and athletics are inextricably connected. Donahue-Shipp and Pumphrey extend this creative connection through their individual artistic practices. Donahue-Shipp will be exhibiting selections from his “basketball bloom” series. These reliefs of basketball and football skins are stitched with shoestrings into large-scale petalled arrangements. The deflated and dark sunbursts from this series are reflections of the many unfulfilled aspirations of Black and Brown boys’ dreams of athletic stardom.
In describing this series, the artist has written, “I’m interested in the alchemy of everyday objects and transcending the confines of their materiality. In my “basketball bloom” series, the mundane basketball is transformed into a radial, mandala-like, symmetrical assemblage that comment on the human touch, history, and place.”
Complementing these works is a screen print from Donahue-Shipp’s “Coach’s Playbook” series, which through gestural drawing overlays the assigned choreography of offensive/defensive moves made by basketball players above the floorplan of a standard judicial courtroom. Donahue-Shipp’s work builds on a lineage of artists of color including Paul Pfeiffer, Esmaa Mohamoud, and David Hammons whose critical considerations of race and sport continually play out in our contemporary society.
Katie Pumphrey is a visual artist and ultra marathon open swimmer. Pulling from her experiences as an athlete, both training in the pool and her ultramarathon swims in open water, the new works she will be exhibiting at Kohl Gallery use abstraction and imagery to investigate our anxieties, fears, and how our imagination plays tricks on us. Incorporating a bit of humor, Pumphrey explores these tensions and the connectedness between human instincts and play.
Freestyle brings these two artists together for their first exhibition in Kent County and the public is invited to visit the gallery and experience their unique works and vision. The Kohl Gallery is fully accessible and open to the public every Tuesday – Saturday from 2 to 5 p.m. and on Wednesdays from 2 to 6 p.m. Viewings are also available by appointment.
For more information or to contact the gallery please visit www.washcoll.edu/about/campus/kohl-gallery/index.php.
About the Artists:
Brandon Donahue-Shipp is a multidisciplinary artist working in painting, drawing, assemblage and public art. His work is rooted in community engagement with an emphasis on sports and connectedness. He has exhibited nationally and internationally including the 13th annual Havana Biennial in Matanzas, Cuba in 2019. Donahue-Shipp’s work is Included in the book publication “Common Practice: Basketball and Contemporary Art” by Carlos Rolon, covering more than a century of artwork from over two hundred leading artists. Donahue-Shipp received his B.S. from Tennessee State University and M.F.A. from The University of Tennessee in Knoxville. Donahue-Shipp is an assistant professor of Art at the University of Maryland, College Park, lives in Baltimore, Md and is represented by Pentimenti Gallery in Philadelphia, PA.
Katie Pumphrey is an interdisciplinary visual artist working in painting, sculpture and installation. Her works have been exhibited in galleries across the United States, including solo exhibitions in Baltimore, Washington, DC, and Key West. Pumphrey received her BFA from the Maryland Institute College of Art in 2009. She has attended residencies at the Vermont Studio Center, Studios of Key West, Gallery Four, and the Creative Alliance. Pumphrey is also an ultramarathon open water swimmer. Her work is deeply connected to her experiences as an athlete, and her time in the water greatly influences and drives her work. Notable swims include the Triple Crown of open water swimming: English Channel, Catalina Channel, and around the Island of Manhattan. Pumphrey is the 194th person (73rd woman) to complete the Triple Crown. In June 2024, Pumphrey became the first person to complete the Bay to Baltimore swim, a 24-mile swim from the Chesapeake Bay Bridge to Baltimore’s Inner Harbor. Pumphrey lives and works in Baltimore, MD.
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