From ideation to creation, Madeline Furtado has had a part in nearly every step of the Light into Density: Abstract Encounters 1920s–1960s exhibition currently on view at the Jan Shrem and Maria Manetti Shrem Museum of Art. The exhibit, which was designed by UC Davis students including Furtado, ends May 5.  

Not only does the collection feature 15 pieces, most of which are now on public view for the first time in decades, by notable 20th century artists, it seeks to expand how viewers see and interpret artwork. Each description label hanging alongside the works has a quote from the artist and interpretations or reactions from the student curators. 

“The way we went about doing the object labels for this exhibition, it was more about having a conversation between the curators and the visitors,” said Furtado, a senior double majoring in art history and design who works on the visitor services team at the museum. “It’s actually more fun to be in a museum when you don’t have to worry about your interpretation of it being correct.” 

Instead of telling visitors the supposed meaning behind a painting, the curators are inviting viewers to create their own interpretations — and to talk about it. Aloud. And in the gallery space. 

“There’s this idea that you have to be quiet in an exhibition space or that museums are places where, generally, people are quiet but the students didn’t want that at all,” said Alexandra Sofroniew, assistant professor of art history. “They wanted visitors to come and talk in the gallery space and discuss the paintings, maybe with the people that they came with or with other visitors in the space.” 

“There's no right or wrong way to look at abstract art,” she added. “You should come in and feel and express your own personal response to each work that you encounter.” 

Sofroniew, along with Professor Tim McNeil and Associate Professor Brett Snyder in the Department of Design, guided a cohort of students through the curatorial and exhibition design process over the course of the 2023 – 2024 academic year. A total of 32 undergraduate and graduate art history, museum studies and design students worked on the exhibition.

“This was a really special iteration of this class this time around because, thanks to the vision of Maria Manetti Shrem, we were able to give the students real world experience of creating an actual exhibition,” Sofroniew said. “We were able to expand outside of the classroom onto the walls of the Manetti Shrem Museum.” 

A peek into a private art collection  

Students in Sofroniew’s exhibition practicum started with a list of 50 paintings by world renowned abstract artists. The assignment was to turn the list into an experience for museum visitors. 

“Essentially our goal was to get visitors to talk about the art and feel confident in their own interpretations of these abstract paintings,” Sofroniew said. 

As part of this process, students viewed the art where it was being displayed at the time. Furtado recalled seeing her favorite piece in Light Into Density — Francis Bacon’s Skull of a Gorilla, 1957 — still on the collector’s wall at home.  

“We went to Maria Manetti Shrem’s apartment where the painting was actually hung for 25 years because it was in her private collection, so I got to see it in her space,” Furtado said.  

Manetti Shrem’s reaction to the piece was included as an object label in the exhibition: 

“I love this beautiful painting by Francis Bacon — its depth and coloration. The deep green makes me calm despite the frightening gorilla's skull floating in the painting that is a reminder of the fragility of life. What an incredible shade of green. It's a beautiful still life that gives me great joy.” — Maria Manetti Shrem 

The experience gave Furtado new insight into something she’d previously only learned about in class: how collectors view art and interact with it on a daily basis. That helped her think about how visitors might engage with the art in a museum setting.  

“Considering how a visitor interacts with the space around them and looks at a piece of art, I feel like that was really important to me in this process,” Furtado said.  

From classroom to early career 

When it came to designing the space around the art — the text, the colors, the lighting — students had a plethora of ideas. Over time, those needed to be edited down and carefully fine-tuned as not to overwhelm the work or visitors experiencing it.  

“Working with the undergrads on the exhibition design, they were really able to develop a vision as both students studying the art but also as young people imagining what it would be like to see some of this art for the first time,” Snyder said. “Almost having this dual role for them, I think, helped them come up with some really great ideas.” 

Being able to let go of some of those ideas is part of the practice.  

“Ultimately with an exhibition like this, it’s about the works themselves — the objects are the key things, they’re the focus,” McNeil said. “The excitement around the paintings is great but it’s also about how does the design support that without getting in the way?” 

That opportunity to apply design principles learned in class to an actual art exhibition was a key reason why students were attracted to the course. 

“I knew from the description that this was going to be a class that would provide real world experience,” said Morgan Strong, an art studio and design double major minoring in art history. “It’s a unique exhibition because of its student influence. And I can look around and see what marks we made, which is really fantastic. I hope people pickup on the nuance that we put into it.” 

To be able to do all this at the undergraduate level was especially impactful for students. In a field notoriously difficult to break into, such opportunities are often reserved for graduate students. 

As a member of the Manetti Shrem’s visitor services team, Furtado felt she had the chance to see the exhibition in a particularly unique way.  

“It’s not only creating the exhibition, it’s also seeing how visitors walk around the space and take in the concepts that we implemented, and it’s analyzing everything that we did and having a first-hand perspective of how the exhibition is being seen by the public,” she said. “With curatorial work, it could easily become creating a space and then not seeing how visitors interact with it, so being able to engage with visitors on an exhibition that I helped curate and design is a really amazing experience to have.” 

The Jan Shrem and Maria Manetti Shrem Museum of Art is open Thursday - Monday, 10 a.m. - 5 p.m. Admission is free.

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