Five new exhibitions open at the Birger Sandzén Memorial Gallery on November 3 and continue through January 12. They feature a collaborative exchange between James Kinser of Chicago and Ruth Moritz of Salina; paintings and prints by former Bethany College art faculty member Nicholas Hill; paintings by Richard Davies of Wichita; prints by Matthew Regier of Matfield Green; and the annual Holiday Gift Show. The opening reception for the exhibitions will be on Sunday, November 3, from 2:00-4:00pm with artist talks beginning at 2:30pm.
The title of James Kinser and Ruth Moritz’s show is Portmanteau, which is defined as a large trunk or suitcase, typically made of stiff leather and opening into two equal parts, or, a word whose form and meaning are derived from a blending of two or more distinct forms. Both definitions are appropriate for this exhibition where the artists have created “Mixed media assemblages that explore threads of memory, lived experience, and connections to our ancestors as a means of celebrating the narratives which we choose to carry and hold dear or release and leave behind.”
James Kinser is a Kansas native and interdisciplinary artist who utilizes performance and costume design to explore idiosyncratic expressions of gender that challenge the traditional, binary male/female construct.
Ruth Moritz is an installation and graphic artist, writer, and former educator. She combines assemblage, text, photography, painting, and textile in her installation work which has been featured at numerous locations throughout the state. 
Printmaker and painter Nicholas Hill lives and works in Granville, Ohio. He is a 2017 Guggenheim Fellow who has exhibited his work extensively and been awarded residencies throughout the world. After receiving his MFA degree from the University of Iowa, he had an extensive teaching career at the State University of New York, Union College, Bethany College, and has recently retired from Otterbein University in Ohio. 
For his exhibition, New Mexico Memories, Hill sourced his memory, journal writings, sketches, ephemera, and photographs from multiple trips to the state to create this current body of work. He reworked older etching plates to create fresh images and developed new paintings.
Matthew Regier is an artist and printmaker who grew up on a corn farm in South Central Nebraska. He is a self-taught artist whose formal study is in philosophy and theology. He and his wife, Tia, are co-founders of The School for Rural Culture and Creativity, a community space that seeks to integrate art, agriculture, and ecology into a vision for a place-based life on the land. Regier is also a gardener and the minister of the Matfield Community Church. 
Regier’s prints reference the prairie as an ecosystem of which the artist is a part. He writes, “The practice of landscape is not simply a case of observing but of being observed. There is no fixed, objective point to view the world but only an exploration from within. In this way the images are a mapping not only of the outside world but of the inner one.”
The Gallery's popular Holiday Gift Show completes the selection of new exhibitions. The work of over 50 invited artists are represented in the show and include paintings, prints, ceramics, jewelry, sculpture, mixed media pieces, and more.
The Birger Sandzén Memorial Gallery is located at 401 N. First Street. Hours are 10:00am-5:00pm Tuesday-Saturday, and 1:00-5:00pm on Sunday. Admission is free, with donations appreciated. Docent tours for groups are available by two-week advance appointment. Click here for more information about Birger Sandzén, the Gallery, and these exhibitions.