Hampshire reveals 'Reporting Back' exhibition

QUEENSBURY, New York (Jan. 20, 2026) — “Sabbatical” implies time spent away from the office and colleagues, but for SUNY Adirondack Professor of Art John Hampshire, the fall semester gave him an opportunity to explore his peers on a deeper level.

Hampshire spent his semester-long sabbatical creating a series of portraits of SUNY Adirondack faculty and staff, "Reporting Back," which will be exhibited Wednesday through April 9 in the college’s Visual Arts Gallery in Dearlove Hall.

“The content and subject matter of my work usually has little to do in any apparent way with the college or its inhabitants, so in looking for a way to engage with the community, it made sense to create works with SUNY ADK community members as subjects,” Hampshire said, explaining how he reached out to the college community asking for colleagues to participate.

“Reporting Back” includes paintings, and charcoal and ink drawings of fellow professors, Evan Sullivan, assistant professor of European History; Kevin Ankeny, distinguished professor of Broadcasting; Brandon Segal, instructor of Media Arts; and Kathleen McCoy, an adjunct and recently retired distinguished professor of English; administrators Megan Mercier, assistant director of SUNY Adirondack Saratoga, and Harley Bradley, assistant director of Student Life; and custodian Todd Mallard, among others.

Also included are Hampshire’s landscapes and weatherscapes, labyrinthine structures of lines in ink, in which he explores variations in his vocabularies of linear marks. “This helps, I hope, to further afford viewers insight into the temporal nature of my working process,” he said.

During his time away, Hampshire also traveled throughout Italy, and attended major art exhibitions in Boston and New York.

He will offer an artist presentation at 12:30 Monday, Feb. 16, in the Visual Arts Gallery.

"John’s sabbatical project offers a thoughtful way of seeing the people who make SUNY Adirondack what it is,” said Rebecca Pelchar, assistant professor of Art History, chair of the Arts, Media & Culture Division, curator of the SUNY Adirondack Art Collection and director of the Visual Arts Gallery. “Through portraiture, he turns familiar faces into subjects of curiosity and reflection, inviting viewers to consider the complexity and individuality of our colleagues.”

The Visual Arts Gallery is open from 10 a.m. to 3 p.m. Monday through Thursday and 5:30 to 7:30 p.m. Tuesday and Wednesday during the academic year.

About the artist

John Hampshire is a professor of Fine Art at SUNY Adirondack, where he has taught for the past 21 years. Among other institutions, he also taught for Oklahoma Arts Institute and, more recently, the University of International Business and Economics in Beijing, China. John’s work has been exhibited at such locations as The Show Walls at 1133 Avenue of the Americas in New York City, The Fine Art Gallery at the State College of Florida, The Hunter Gallery in Middleton, Rhode Island, The Brattleboro Museum, and the Project Room at the Phoenix Gallery in New York City. John lives and maintains a studio in the former Church of the Holy Trinity in Troy, New York, and at Cornerstone Studios in New York City. He earned a bachelor’s degree in art from Skidmore College and a master’s degree in fine art from University at Albany.