Events

I Wish That I Had Spoken Only of It All: 20 Years of Sheryl Oring’s I Wish to Say
2024-09-03 00:00 - 2024-12-20 23:59 (America/New_York) | DiMattio Gallery at Rechnitz Hall
Curated by Corey Dzenko, Associate Professor of Art History
With backgrounds in journalism and fine art, Sheryl Oring began her ongoing project I Wish to Say in 2004 from a concern that many people’s voices were not being heard. She started to take dictation from the public about what they wanted to say to the (next) President. Dressed as a 1960s secretary with a typewriter, she records whatever participants say onto a postcard, making copies with carbon paper. During larger events, a secretarial bank takes dictation. Oring mails the postcards to the White House and exhibits copies. To date she has typed over 4241 postcards.
For this exhibition, MU’s DiMattio Gallery will chronologically display hundreds of I Wish to Say postcards, photographs, and videos of performances, along with larger prints of select postcard texts. A timeline on the wall will note the presidential elections that span Oring’s project. The empty wall space for 2024 will fill as MU student-typists add postcards they collect during the current election season. The other half of the gallery will showcase a selection of Oring’s related projects that all involve a question, active listening, and a typewriter for a secretary to record dictation. These include Collective Memory (September 2011), recorded memories of the 9-11 attacks; Travel Desk (2014), travel stories that were then carved into a wooden table now installed in the San Diego International Airport; and other artworks.
Multi-part programming will include an artist’s talk to showcase Oring’s timely and inclusive artmaking practice. MU students will participate as typists at numerous live events throughout the exhibition’s duration. MU faculty from various disciplines will hold public teach-ins in the gallery about topics related to Oring’s project. Finally, MU is collaborating with nearby Neptune and Long Branch school districts so that high school students can dictate their own postcards to the future president. As an educator, Oring has involved younger constituencies, empowering the next generation of participants in both US democracy and artmaking.
Oring performs I Wish to Say: Thursday, September 19, 2024, 11am-1pm, Rebecca Stafford Student Center Patio
Artist talk: Thursday, September 19, 2024, 4:30-5:30pm, Great Hall Auditorium
Opening Reception: Thursday, September 19, 2024, 5:30-7:30pm, DiMattio Gallery, Rechnitz Hall
About the Artist
Sheryl Oring examines critical social issues through projects that incorporate old and new media to tell stories, examine public opinion, and foster open exchange. Using tools typically employed by journalists (the camera, the typewriter, the pen, the interview, and the archive), she builds on her experience in her former profession to create installations, performances, artist books, and internet-based works that address themes of citizenship, free expression, first amendment rights, story-telling, and activism through art. Oring received her MFA from the University of California at San Diego. She is currently a board member for the National Coalition Against Censorship. She has held several academic positions, most recently serving as the Dean of the School of Art at University of the Arts in Philadelphia.
Oring has shown her work at the O1SJ Biennial; Bryant Park in Manhattan; the Brooklyn Public Library; and the Jewish Museum Berlin. She has also presented work at Art in Odd Places in New York; the Art Prospect festival in St. Petersburg, Russia; Encuentro in São Paolo, Brazil; and the International Symposium on Electronic Art in Dubai. She has completed public art commissions at the San Diego and Tampa International Airports. Collecting institutions include the Library of Congress; Museum of Modern Art; Tate Britain; Bibliothèque nationale de Luxembourg; and many others.
For more information, see: https://www.sheryloring.org/
Or contact Dr. Corey Dzenko, cdzenko@monmouth.edu
This exhibition was made possible with funding from the Edna Wright Andrade Fund of the Philadelphia Foundation and from the Diversity Innovation Grant Program coordinated by the Office of the Provost and Intercultural Center at Monmouth University. Thank you also to ArtNOW, the Helen Bennett McMurray Endowed Chair of Social Ethics, and Monmouth University’s Department of Art and Design and Department of Curriculum and Instruction.

Michael Anthony Donato: Angels & Devils
2024-09-03 05:00 - 2024-12-10 04:59 | Pollak Gallery
Michael Anthony Donato, a School of Visual Arts graduate, is an award-winning children’s book illustrator. His work on Squanto and the First Thanksgiving aired on Showtime and earned honors from the American Library Association. His illustrations for Tales Alive, a collection of global folktales, received a Parents’ Choice Award. Donato also collaborated with Simon & Schuster and the Metropolitan Museum of Art on Voyage Up the Nile. He currently teaches drawing and advanced painting at Monmouth University.
Artist Reception: October 18, 5-7 PM

Mike Richison’s Election Collection: 2004-2024
2024-09-13 00:00 - 2024-12-20 23:59 | Rotary Ice House Gallery
Mike Richison’s Election Collection: 2004-2020 showcases 20 years of design and video art inspired by the presidential election cycle. Richison began working with this topic in 2004 when he created a short video loop of George W. Bush drinking water during the debates. This evolved into performances and interactive video projects that break down language into musical and abstract elements.
The culmination of these explorations is Electo Electro 2024, an interactive installation that enables participants to produce techno-inspired beats using video clips of presidential candidates. This project combines iMacs, iPads, custom software, and the housing from decommissioned Diebold AccuVote TS voting booths. Users can remix videos from political rallies and debates in a structured sixteen beat loop. An iPad-based touchscreen design parodies the system employed by the AccuVote, a voting system that was difficult to audit and susceptible to hacking.
As a parody, the format of Richison’s installation resembles a polling station, while the branding and graphic elements of the project hearken back to vintage electronic devices. The AccuVote debuted in the early 2000s as the poster child of the Help America Vote Act. After its widespread adoption, a group of researchers discovered a long list of vulnerabilities that can lead to stolen votes, lost votes, or a failure of the computer itself. The project deals with expectation, failure, and vulnerability
On the opening day and throughout the run of the exhibit, Richison will perform and demonstrate this project. His goal is to “encourage users to examine media and become individuals who can control media, rather than be controlled by it.”
This event is being held in conjuction with ArtNOW’s Mike Richison, Electo Electro 2024 on October 4 at 10:15 AM.
About the artist, Mike Richison: Mike Richison is a multimedia artist and an Associate Professor at Monmouth University, where he teaches motion graphics. He employs a variety of approaches to artmaking, including sculpture, graphic design, and interactive video. His work utilizes found objects, such as turntables, voting booths, and scavenged video clips as well as the Max MSP Jitter programming environment. Richison has exhibited at Autonomous Cultural Centre Medika (Zagreb, Croatia); Figment NYC and Art in Odd Places (New York); and Peters Valley School of Craft and Morris Museum (New Jersey). His projects have received attention in outlets such as Leonardo, VICE, FACT Magazine, Hyperallergic, WABC-TV Channel 7 News New York, and The Washington Post. Before moving to New Jersey in 2007, he lived in the Detroit, MI, area for several years.

Women's Flag Football Clinic
2024-09-16 00:00 - 2024-10-12 23:59 | Hesse Field on The Great Lawn
Monmouth Recreation will be offering a Women’s Flag Football Clinic. Clinics open to all girls of any skill level! We will teach you flag football skills, knowledge and strategy, and students will have the opportunity to play actual games. Our clinics are an awesome way to meet people and make new friends on campus! Additionally, students will have a chance to make the flag football team that will play in the NIRSA Regional Championships down at the University of Maryland. The clinic will begin the week of September 16th!
Register for the clinic or email for any questions!

Intramural 7v7 Flag Football
2024-09-16 00:00 - 23:59 | Hesse Field on The Great Lawn
Monmouth Recreation is offering Intramural 7v7 Flag Football for all students. There will be a men’s and women’s league. The leagues will run from September 16th to October 11th. The leagues will be comprised of teams of 7-12 members and games will be played Monday-Thursday nights.
Register for the league online or email pkovac@monmouth.edu for any questions!

Pop-up Professional Clothing Boutique
2024-10-03 11:00 - 16:00 | Anacon Hall, 2nd Floor, Student Center
Have an upcoming interview? Just started as an intern?
Stop by Anacon B on Thursday, Oct. 3rd from 11am-4pm to suit-up for success! Come browse through a collection of professional clothing attire donated by the Monmouth campus community in partnership with Lunch Break and Clara’s Closet.
All clothing items are FREE when you present your Student ID!

Art Club General Meeting & Rock Painting
2024-10-03 13:30 - 14:30 | Rechnitz 605
An information meeting for newcomers and upcoming events – meet new people and paint a rock with us!

Women's Soccer at Stony Brook
2024-10-03 18:00 - 20:00 | Stony Brook, NY
Monmouth University Women’s Soccer at Stony Brook
Streaming Video: https://flosports.link/3IzwagG

College Democrats General Meeting
2024-10-03 19:30 - 20:30 | Intercultural Center Lounge
Biweekly meeting of the Monmouth University College Democrats chapter.
