"I Am a Material" Exhibition Explores the Body Through Sculpture

Now on display in the Barn Annex through April 21, I Am a Material showcases the inventive and deeply personal work of students in the eponymous sculpture course. This exhibition invites viewers into a raw, exploratory space where the body, materials, and identity intersect.

The course—taught by Sculpture faculty member John Umphlett—asks students to break down and rebuild their relationships with physical materials and with their own bodies. Through techniques such as body casting, wire rigging, and fabrication, students explored how form, movement, and meaning evolve when the body becomes both subject and tool.

“The most meaningful thing for me in this class was learning how to be comfortable introducing my physical body into the conversation of my artwork,” shared Maverick Yarger ’27. “I have already noticed an impact on my further work...I’m more excited about working with the body in all sorts of media.

Umphlett notes that the course was designed to push students to consider how “the materials around us in many ways become parts of us.” Students responded to prompts that required not just technical skill but personal inquiry and created works that reflect diverse identities, bodies, and conceptual intentions.

On view are projects by Tali Mars ’25, Maia Devoy ’26, Claire Dolan ’26, Chris Golovina ’25, Galen Harwood ’27, Audrey Luv Pena ’27, KayJ Mills ’28, Lila Quigley ’26, Sasha Saedan ’26, Kitty Bailey ’27, Maggie Weddle ’27, and Maverick Yarger ’27. Each explores the fusion of self and structure. Through experimentation, prototyping, and performance, these artists redefine how we think about material, movement, and the self in space.

Photos of the works reveal a broad spectrum of media—aqua resin, epoxy resin, fiberglass, hair, latex, silicon rubber, expandable foam, plaster gauze, alginate, acrylic, wood, a variety of fabrics, and LEDs—brought to life in sculptural expressions that are as tactile as they are conceptual. They also used woodshop equipment and the Co2 laser in assisting with project implementation. 

Sculptor and Bennington faculty member John Umphlett uses his own body as both material and subject in his work, most recently in the piece Bit Death; Life; He Blows on Them and They Wither, a cross-shaped steel structure precisely built to encase him, which was a part of the North Bennington Outdoor Sculpture Show in 2024.