NORFOLK, VA.- The Barry Art Museum presents a selection of artworks representative of the universally shared experiences and emotions of the Covid-19 era. Pandemic: Reflecting on a Year in Quarantine reflects, uplifts and inspires through dance, sculpture, painting, glass, mixed media and video. The exhibition is on view through June 1, 2021 with free admission. The Barry Art Museum is open Tuesday - Friday 11:00 AM - 5:00 PM and Saturday - Sunday 12:00 PM - 5:00 PM.

Pandemic brings together works focusing on such diverse themes as microbiology, environmentalism, human connection, and macro/microcosmos, many from the Museum’s permanent collection.

Works on view by artists Peter Eudenbach, Luke Jerram, Anne Neely, and Julia and Robin Rogers, explore the role of the artist and their ability to translate the human condition into metaphor and transcendence .

In Victoria’s Hideaway (pictured right), part of glass-blowing team Julia and Robin Rogers series The Architecture of the Mind, the subject of the sculpture is depicted with an attic on her head, a candle flickering on the inside. This lonely soul is trapped in her own mind and memories. Though this piece was made long before the Covid-19 pandemic swept the world, it reflects the inner turmoil evinced from extended isolation.

The contemporary artworks are complemented by two performance art pieces by Janessa Clark. Communion (pictured left), is an experimental screendance response, which invited 40 dancers, separated by physical distance and the pandemic, into a digital space to commune together. Each unique duet is created from videos by two different dancers who are separated by cities, countries, and sometimes continents. Artist Janessa Clark combines these videos to create virtual duets which are set to music donated by a composer also collaborating remotely.

Many of these artists have ties to Old Dominion University, presenting pieces at the Barry Art Museum as both a marker and a salve for a year in quarantine.