(WJET/WFXP) — A new long-term exhibition is coming to the Erie art scene.
The Erie Art Museum will welcome artist Patricia Bellan-Gillen’s exhibition, Monsters, Beloveds and Invisible Whales, in the Main Gallery from September 3, 2026, through March 7, 2027.
The museum will host a public reception on opening day, Thursday, September 3, from 5 to 8 p.m. Attendance is free for museum members while standard admission applies to non-members.
The exhibition of drawings and mixed-medium works are centered on the boundaries between memory and myth, drawing on personal narrative, fairytales and pop culture ephemera, according to the museum’s gallery description.
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Bellan-Gillen describes her work as pursuing “a weird elegance,” confronting viewers with beauty, humor and uncanniness. Her pieces mix familiar, layered images — like the White Rabit or Humpty Dumpty — to create a strangeness that demands a closer look.
“Most people think of drawing as a sketch, something on the way to a painting. Bellan-Gillen’s work stands on its own. That’s the kind of work the Erie Art Museum wants to put in front of our community. Art that pushes past what people expect,” said Laura Domencic, executive director of the Erie Art Museum.
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Bellan-Gillen will also take part in an artist talk on Sunday, October 18, from 2 to 4 p.m. She will speak on the drawings and works in the show as well as her approach to “weird elegance.”
Bellan-Gillen comes to the Erie Art Museum with a 29-year background as a professor at Carnegie Mellon University’s School of Art, where she held the role of Dorothy L. Stubnitz Endowed Chair. Her work has been the focus of more than 50 solo exhibitions across the country.
For more information on the exhibition, click here. To learn more about the upcoming artist talk, click here. To read a conversation about the exhibition with the artist herself, click here.
The Erie Art Museum is open Wednesday through Sunday. Admission is $10 for adults, $8 for seniors and students, $2 for individuals with an ACCESS EBT card (for up to four people) and free for active-duty military members and those under the age of 16.
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