About This Exhibition

Ritual and Desire explores the tenuous line between historical aesthetics and contemporary attitudes through the work of three artists: Beth Lipman, Cassandra C. Jones, and Lauren Fensterstock.

While each harnesses the artistry of previous ages, each artist masterfully projects those styles into our contemporary world, revealing the unbreakable ties to our past in our present. The simultaneous blurring and expansion of time and aesthetic results in work that is both familiar and foreign to the eye. It invites reflection on issues of transience and permanence, the material and immaterial, and reduction and excess.

The exhibition continues WAM’s exploration of Steuben’s legacy in contemporary glass. Ritual and Desire: Contemporary Glass Art is organized by the Wichita Art Museum.

White wooden table covered in glass objects, forms and containers of varying sizes with glass decor attached the wall behind

Beth Lipman, Cut Table, 2014. Glass, wood, paint, adhesive, 80 x 72 x 26 inches. Wichita Art Museum, Museum Purchase, F. Price Cossman Memorial Trust, INTRUST Bank, Trustee

Gallery image of black glass installation. Large rectangle of glass on the floor with three sculptures on the wall in the background

Gallery installation of Reflecting Pool (Colorless Field 5) and three works from the  Scrying series by Lauren Fenterstock

A commission by WAM for wallpaper designed using images of the Wichita Art Museum's Steuben collection of glass. The photos in Blind Glass were taken, under instruction of Cassandra C. Jones, by Kirk Eck, WAM. The collage was composed by Jones, at her studio in Ojai, CA. The original commission was for

Cassanda C. Jones, Blind Glass, 2017. Digital file, dimensions vary. Wichita Art Museum, Museum Purchase, F. Price Cossman Memorial Trust, INTRUST Bank, Trustee


Our Generous Sponsors

The presentation has been generously supported by the F. Price Cossman Trust, INTRUST Bank, Trustee. Richard Smith and Sondra Langel are major supporters. Belger Cartage Service, Inc. is a corporate sponsor.

Exhibition support is provided by Helen and Ed Healy, Sonia Greteman and Chris Brunner, Charles Baker, DeVore Foundation, Louise Beren, Nancy and John Brammer, and Sue and Kurt Watson.

All museum exhibitions receive generous sponsorship from the Friends of the Wichita Art Museum Endowment Fund and the City of Wichita.