Between Spirit and Matter Art Exhibit

An opening reception was held on September 21 in Miller Hall for the new multimedia exhibit, “Between Spirit and Matter” by Utah-based artist, Beth Krensky. Maddie Blonquist Shrum Div ’22 co-curated the exhibit and facilitated a panel following the artist’s talk.

The exhibit is an installation of performance pieces and ritual artifacts. Glowing alabaster edifices, tinkling prayer shawls, and fluttering wings transform historic Miller Hall, located at 406 Prospect Street, into hallowed ground. Rooted in the centuries-old Jewish traditions and influenced by more recent familial memory, Krensky’s materially compelling works are rich with meaning, welcoming participation and creating sanctuary.

As an acclaimed art educator and maker, Krensky considers herself to be “a gatherer of things—objects, words, spirit—and a connector of fragments, to make us whole.” In videography of her performance works, relics both real and imagined, and tenderly crafted textiles, the artist embraces liminality in an effort to sanctify bodies, spaces, and objects. This exhibition invites viewers to inhabit the space Krensky does herself: the in-between of matter and spirit, the profane and the sacred.

About the Artist

Beth Krensky is an area head and professor of art teaching in the department of art & art History at the University of Utah. She received her formal art training from Tufts University/School of the Museum of Fine Arts and MIT’s center for advanced visual studies. She was one of five founding members of the international artist collective, the Artnauts. Her work is intended to provoke reflection about what is happening in our world as well as to create a vision of what is possible.

She is also a scholar of youth-created art for social change. She holds an M.Ed. from the Harvard Graduate School of Education and a Ph.D. in educational foundations from the University of Colorado at Boulder.

In 2022, Krensky was named the Utah higher education art educator of the year and in 2019, she was selected as one of Utah’s 15 Most Influential Artists. Among her academic honors, she has been awarded the presidential scholar, public service professor, and distinguished teaching awards from the University of Utah. She is currently one of five performance art finalists for the 16th Arte Laguna Prize. 

Co-curator

Maddie Blonquist Shrum is a recent graduate of Yale Divinity School (M.A.R. visual arts and material culture, 2022) and the Institute of Sacred Music. She holds a certificate in public humanities from Yale University and has worked at several art institutions, most recently the Yale University Art Gallery, Utah Museum of Contemporary Art, and the Brigham Young University Museum of Art. She is passionate about collaboration, arts accessibility, and museum studies—all interests that have led her to pursue a career in art curation, education, and publication.