Scratch and Tear: Works by Winifred McNeill

Kean University Galleries and Collections is pleased to announce a solo exhibition in the Nancy Dryfoos Gallery, _Scratch and Tear: Works by Winifred McNeill_, on view September 8, 2026 through December 4, 2026. The opening reception for the artist will be held on Tuesday, October 6 from 5:30 – 7:30 P.M. in the Nancy Dryfoos Gallery. The Nancy Dryfoos Gallery, in the Nancy Thompson Learning Commons, is open to the public Monday through Friday 10:00 A.M. – 4:00 P.M. Winifred McNeill's work almost always starts with drawing. McNeill often draws on unexpected and demanding surfaces. In _Center of the Universe_, graphite is applied to the concave side of a seashell, responding to the surface irregularities. Metal pipe tees push out of the wall in _Industrial Strength,_ revealing the anatomy of their spaces, which are coated with plaster to create a drawing surface bearing small graphite renderings of the exterior of the human body. McNeill's feat of conquering material is matched by her equally challenging choice of subject matter: Hands, private parts, and perfect circles. Her preparatory ink drawings for the limited-edition letterpress book _The Helen Fragments_ flesh out the life of Helen of Troy beyond her beauty and abduction using passages from Homer's epic _The Iliad_. In a suite of prints made at the Brodsky Center, McNeill addresses drawing in a different way, through the manipulation of the paper substrate by the body. The print becomes a napkin that absorbs the imprint of lipstick, a veiled surface swept away by a tear, or a hole torn by a fingernail.