Student artwork captures Baird Point — eight different ways

To every person who passes through it, a place or landmark means something different. To one individual, a building or plaza may be the site of many happy memories, while to another, the same location may represent the new and unexplored.

That peculiarity of perspective is the allure of IconicUB, a new collection of artwork on campus.

Dreamed up by UB’s social media team, the project consists of eight paintings and illustrations of Baird Point crafted by UB students. The university unveiled one piece every other week during the spring semester to UB’s social media followers, and the whole series is now on display in the physical world.

The show, located in the lobby of 330 Crofts Hall on the North Campus, is open from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. on weekdays through the end of June. (The gallery is closed on Memorial Day).

Among the works is a shadowy oil painting by fine art major Lisa Deabreu, who depicted Baird Point at night because she felt it was more alive and vibrant after dark: “It had an eerie sense of awe to it,” she wrote in her artist’s statement.

J. Akasya Crosier, a student in communication and studio art, painted the lakeside columns with cotton candy clouds in the sky — pink and white and fluffy — a scene that recalled dinnertime walks she took between the Ellicott Complex and the Student Union during her freshman and sophomore years.

Other artists chose more abstract portrayals, with one interpreting the architecture of Baird Point through lines of diverse thicknesses, each penned in black permanent marker and joining with other lines and shapes at varied angles.

“It’s interesting to see different visions of the same thing, and how singular it is for every person,” said Ann Whitcher-Gentzke, content editor for UB’s alumni magazine, At Buffalo, who attended a May 12 opening for the IconicUB gallery. The event featured three of the student artists, a conversation on art and a summery blueberry punch.

The IconicUB project is a mash-up of two ideas that inspired it: the “redditgetsdrawn” forum, where users of the Reddit social network put out an open call for various artists to illustrate the same thing, and a promotion for HBO’s “Looking,” in which the cable network commissioned known artists to illustrate characters on the show.

From these two concepts, IconicUB was born: a targeted call for specific student artists to interpret university landmarks. The goal is to choose a new spot on campus and a new set of artists every year, said organizer Jacob Schupbach, an intern in University Communications and a former HBO brand ambassador.

“I think what really motivated us to pick Baird Point was that when we come to UB as freshmen, we all go to Baird Point at least once, for orientation or a campus tour,” said Schupbach, who planned IconicUB with guidance from Rebecca Bernstein, director of strategy and online communications in University Communications, who first stumbled upon the Reddit forum.

Baird Point’s prominent role in student activities makes it a center of life at UB, often a beginning point for years of experiences, and that’s what makes it special, Schupbach said. A business administration and studio art major, he did a painting of his own for IconicUB.

For Schupbach and fellow student artists, the project’s attraction was the same as for their audience: seeing a familiar space through many eyes.

“I was really excited to see everyone else’s work — what different mediums they were using and what styles they were using,” said Danielle Saeva, a sophomore in studio art who drew Baird Point in pastel hues that imparted a sense of peace. “It was like a collaboration without actually collaborating.”