Art Gallery Two

Campus Art

MCC is home to four galleries on campus, with exhibitions from students, alumni, and emerging and established artists. The galleries feature diverse solo and group exhibitions that are curated to expose students and the community to a wide range of media, styles, and content utilized in contemporary art practice. Visiting artists often present lectures and workshops in conjunction with exhibitions. Check the gallery exhibit schedule for updates. All galleries are free and open to the public.

The galleries are also used to exhibit student work and specific course-related installations and projects.
All MCC students are encouraged to propose installation projects for artspace144.

In addition to rotating gallery exhibitions, McHenry County College has selections from the permanent collection and loaned artworks displayed across campus. These include The Portrait in Print Collection, which is permanently exhibited in the MCC library, and large-scale sculptures located on several sites around the MCC campus.

The Permanent Art Collection

The Permanent Art Collection comprises over 500 works purchased by the college from visiting artists, current MCC students and faculty, and MCC alumni, as well as artworks donated through the Friends of MCC Foundation. The collection is displayed around campus to represent and support the curriculum and broader community, and it is constantly growing and evolving with the additions of new acquisitions and donations.


Escobar Kathleen Model for a New Time

Kathleen Escobar
Model for a New Time, 2021
Stoneware

Andrea Velazquez, Ophelia

Andrea Velazquez
Ophelia, 2022
Archival inkjet print

Linda Cannizzo, Indra’s Net

Linda Cannizzo
Indra’s Net, 2021
Oil on canvas

  • The Portrait in Print Collection

    Donated to MCC through the Friends of MCC Foundation over the course of nearly thirty years by McHenry County residents Mary and Charles Liebman, the Portrait in Print Collection is an impressive assembly of over 270 original fine art prints, including woodcuts, intaglios, lithographs, serigraphs, and several drawings and mixed media works. The collection of portraits provides visitors with not only a broad range of masterful printmaking techniques and modes of expression demonstrated by renowned artists but also an intriguing view of diverse historical figures who left a significant imprint on our world – painters, writers, musicians, composers, scientists, philosophers, activists, sports and political figures, among others.

    Among portrait subjects included in the collection are Abraham Lincoln, Walt Whitman, Gertrude Stein, Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., Crazy Horse, Mick Jagger, Madame Marie Curie, the Marquis de Sade, and Emiliano Zapata. The range of artists who created these prints is as diverse and impressive as the subjects of the portraits. Renowned artists in the collection include Pablo Picasso, Henri Matisse, Man Ray, Marc Chagall, Francis Bacon, Leonard Baskin, Andy Warhol, and Diego Rivera, among many others. 

    The collection is permanently exhibited in the MCC Library and the Liebman Science Center, allowing students, employees, and the community continuous access to each work and the ability to utilize the collection for further research into the portrait subjects, artists, and printmaking process.

  • Sculpture at MCC

    Opportunity Knocks by Michael Helbing
    Corten steel, 1998
    Located on the grounds of MCC, Building C

    Trilogy: Growth, Development, Interaction by Richard Hunt
    Welded stainless steel, 1994
    Funds provided by the Friends of MCC Foundation and the Illinois Arts Council
    Located on the grounds of MCC, Entrance One
    MCC Celebrates On-Campus Art by Prominent Sculptor Richard Hunt

    Stretcher by Patrick McDonald
    Wood, steel, concrete, 1998
    Located on the grounds of MCC, Building A

    Sunrizon by Tom Scarff
    Aluminum, neon, 2002
    Funds provided by the State of Illinois and the Friends of MCC Foundation
    Located in the Atrium, Building A, Main Level

    Orion II by Isaac Witkin
    Steel, 1981
    Donated by Morton Thiokol Co. through the Friends of MCC Foundation
    Located in the Zen Garden (Building A courtyard)

    Homage to the Earth by Glenn Zweygardt
    Granite, bronze, steel, cast glass, 1998
    Located on the grounds of MCC, Building E

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