Rhetorically, tautology is the restating of a thesis for emphasis. Phonetically, TAUT is the past tense of teaching. Mercer University’s McEachern Art Center is proud to present TAUT: Recent MFAs Revisited, an exhibition featuring recently-graduated Master of Fine Arts recipients from across the Southeast whose thesis exhibitions were stymied by the coronavirus pandemic.

The MFA is a terminal degree in Fine Art. The culmination of this educational trajectory is the thesis and the exhibition of this work. These showcases act as an introduction for artists to the professional field, often attended by friends, family, media, curators, and potential collectors. It is a significant blow to miss this crescendo. The projects on view here are independent statements from careers on the cusp.  We are thrilled to restage some significant efforts from the last season of thesis shows in the Southeast here at the MAC.

The MAC aspires to serve emerging artists and source exhilarating works to showcase in Macon. Our community is richer, deeper, and perhaps a little wilder for these efforts. The work on view in TAUT ranges in media including sculpture, drawing, video, painting, and functional ceramics. The messages embedded in each oeuvre are explained throughout the gallery. All of the participating artists are individually deserving of attention, yet the dialog on display here is greater than the sum of its parts somehow; a poem between the pieces. The MAC hopes to provide some momentum to this deserving cadre by bringing accomplishments from their recent pasts to give our guests a glimpse at the near future of the field.