Cari Freno

Associate Professor of Art and Art History in Sculpture and Drawing

Cari Freno (b. Cleveland, Ohio) is an artist living and working in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. She has exhibited her work both nationally and internationally including venues in Chongqing, China and Berlin, Germany. Her work has been exhibited at Redux Contemporary Art Center in Charleston, South Carolina and in various other national exhibitions. She spent time in Williamsport, Pennsylvania as an artist-in-residence at The Pajama Factory and as a Landscape Experience Fellow at Mildred’s Lane in Beach Lake Pennsylvania.

Department

Art and Art History

Degrees

B.F.A The University of the Arts

M.F.A Virginia Commonwealth University

Teaching

Drawing

Sculpture

Studio Practices

Common Intellectual Experience

Website

www.carifreno.com

Research Interests

video installation

material studies

performance

drawing

intergenerational trauma

environmental psychology

personality development

emotional emancipation

family systems

Recent Work

2019

Video Snack 7: Video Object (screening), Grace Street Theater, VCU, VA

SCREEN 2019:Climates (screening), Studio Arts Building, UMASS Amherst, MA

Internal/External, juried by Sarah Martin, Arts Council of Southeast Missouri, Cape Girardeau, MO

Art Uncovered. Interview by Kimberly Ruth. Jan , http://www.btrtoday.com/listen/artuncovered/cari-freno/

2018

Electron Salon , Los Angeles Center for Digital Art, Los Angeles, CA

The Woodmere Annual: 77^th Juried Exhibition, The Woodmere Museum of Art, Philadelphia, PA

X +1 Vox Accelerated , Vox Populi Gallery, Philadelphia, PA

Temporal and Corporeal: A Broad Scope of Performance Art, Ohio University Art Galleries, Athens, OH

2017

Lessness, Crawford Campus Center Gallery at Episcopal Academy, PA (solo show)

Sum Certain, The Alber Gallery at Allens Lane, PA (solo show)

A Dubious Procedure, Bowdoin College (dual channel video installation), ME (solo show)

Scene/Unseen, A Public Art Installation on Ursinus College Campus, Collegeville, PA

Artist Statement #2, CICA Museum, Gyeonggi-do, Korea

This Is Now Video Series, Gateway Film Center, Columbus, OH

20/92 Video Screening, Icebox, Philadelphia, PA

Marks, Jon. “Ursinus Jewish Star Exhibit A Portrait of Life Then and Now” The Jewish Exponent, Sept. 6

http://jewishexponent.com/2017/09/06/ursinus-jewish-star-exhibit-portrait-life-now/

Related News

Linked Inquiry: Politics and Art

Art has always played a role in politics, and over the years, it has become an essential medium to express opinions about democracy. This academic year, students in associate professor Cari Freno’s sculpture class and associate professor Annie Karreth’s “How Democracies Die” politics class came together to create a public art installation on the Ursinus College campus.

Together, the students created inflatable lawn ornaments that convey messages about some of the most pressing political topics today.

“Resistance means taking up space, whether that means occupying a physical space and getting as many people there as possible, or in this case, a piece of art that literally takes up space and forces you to confront an issue,” Karreth said.

“No one’s demanding that you like stop and look at it, but maybe you’ll spend a couple of seconds thinking about what the meaning behind the image is,” Freno added. “It’s a different way of understanding the world.”

Karreth’s “How Democracies Die” course was part of the Democratic Erosion Consortium, a partnership of researchers, students, policymakers, and practitioners committed to marshaling evidence and learning to address the growing crisis of democratic erosion worldwide.