Current Exhibitions

See Hamon Arts Library hours of operation for exhibit times

There are three ways to measure a body of water: by surface area, volume, or depth. Sounding is the term used to describe this last method. Unlike assessing a visible surface area, sounding is an act of remote sensing. It allows you to gather information on something you can’t make physical contact with. The contents in a library is like a body of water. It holds a volume of material within a clearly defined space, while also possessing a kind of impalpable depth. 

In Sounding, Packer uses text and sculptural interventions to explore the relationship between the library’s known and unknowable qualities. Through this artwork, the Hawn Gallery and Hamon Arts Library’s tangible architectural spaces become a framework to plumb the immeasurable depths of knowledge that the building contains.

Image credit: Courtesy of the artist

See Hamon Arts Library hours of operation for exhibit times

Dan Wingren was an artist and teacher active in Texas, beginning in the 1940s when he was a student at SMU. After graduate school at the University of Iowa, he came back to Texas where he accepted art-related appointments in Austin and San Antonio before returning to Dallas in the 1960s. Primarily known as a painter, Wingren was both a popular and admired professor of art at SMU, where he taught several subjects including 19th- and 20th-century art history, contemporary art, design, drawing and painting.