BROOKINGS (10-26-26) — The South Dakota State University School of Design presents “Forma Nascendi,” a joint exhibition featuring oil paintings by Hope Burkhalter and mixed-media assemblages by Catherine Jones.
On view at the Ritz Gallery Nov. 9-20, the students’ Bachelor of Fine Arts thesis exhibition explores how identities and perceptions take shape through memory, relationships and transformation.
The gallery is open Monday through Friday, 8 a.m.-5 p.m., and admission is free. An opening reception will take place Monday, Nov. 9, from 5-7 p.m.
Working from photographs of her childhood, Burkhalter explores personal development and familial relationships. By translating familiar images into oil paintings, she revisits moments that have shaped her understanding of herself and the world around her.
Burkhalter is a Brookings native majoring in studio art – art education.
Jones investigates the evolution of self and perception through assemblages that bring her discarded, defective or undervalued art artifacts into conversation with unconventional materials and processes. These pairings preserve traces of earlier histories while creating new relationships, challenging inherited ideas about identity, usefulness and value.
Jones is from White and is majoring in studio art – ceramics, sculpture, printmaking and painting.
Together, Burkhalter and Jones approach formation as an ongoing process. Through the reinterpretation of personal images and material histories, their works consider how the past continues to shape the present — and how familiar things can hold possibilities for becoming something new.
The Ritz Gallery is located in Grove Hall at SDSU, south of the University Student Union between Mathews and Brown residence halls. Admission is free. Parking is available in the Union lot.
About South Dakota State University
Founded in 1881, South Dakota State University is the state’s Morrill Act land-grant institution as well as its largest, most comprehensive school of higher education. SDSU confers degrees from seven different colleges representing more than 230 majors, minors and specializations. The institution also offers 41 master’s degree programs, 19 Ph.D. and two professional programs.
The work of the university is carried out on a residential campus in Brookings, at sites in Sioux Falls, Pierre and Rapid City, and through Extension offices and Agricultural Experiment Station research sites across the state. SDSU’s research expenditures for the 2026 fiscal year were more than $86 million. SDSU has a Doctoral University: High Research Activity designation on The Carnegie Classification of Institutions of Higher Education.
For more information: SDSU News • www.sdstate.edu
— From SDSU University Marketing and Communications
