New Exhibition at the Reid Hall Caféothèque Featuring René D. Shoemaker

This exhibition is on view from September 3 to November 6, 2025. The Caféothèque is open to Reid Hall cardholders Monday through Thursday from 8:30 a.m. to 6 p.m. and Friday from 8:30 a.m. to 3 p.m.

Exhibition Text

René Shoemaker carries her world in a suitcase.
 With ease, she leaps from the train station to the exhibition space. Like a magician, she opens her treasure chest, unfurls, unrolls, unfolds: before our astonished eyes, delicate and radiant colors awaken from their slumber...

A texture, a shimmering surface that gently lets light pass through and invites us to caress the volutuptuous silk. Then, the sheer scale of the works imposes itself: entire walls come alive before us. An architecture emerges—constructed through the fluidity of fabric and the irresistible force of color. An architecture that plays with the wind, flirts with the light... while remaining firmly anchored in reality: the titles of the works point us toward tangible places—addresses, street corners, city maps, urban perspectives, and skylines.

René Shoemaker’s bold lines simplify the architectural forms; they are almost mnemonic sketches, preserving the memory of a façade, a hue, a view... They are sublimated by the precious materials, magnified by their size (the scale is sometimes one-third of the actual size!). No, there is no abstraction in Shoemaker’s world, but rather an exercise in synthesis that seems to sum-up a lifetime of active observation.

At this point: what if we were to rewind, if we folded up the entire exhibition back into its suitcase? It seems to me that this American wanderer, who at 18 years old roamed the East Coast in the 1970s, is still there. In that suitcase, too, is the adventurous cyclist who, upon retirement and accompanied by her husband, fell in love with a traditional farmhouse in the Creuse and decided to settle there. Because having once built a home in Georgia (USA), and worked her whole life with books and works of art, René Shoemaker nevertheless retains the nomadic spirit she had since adolescence. Yet it is a nomadism drawn irresistibly to what remains still...

The works do not fit in their entirety in the small university coffee shop at La Caféothèque Reid Hall. We had to be clever, and play with the space, sometimes sewing hems to adapt the pieces. And so, I think of these buildings she depicts, whose concrete nature contrasts strangely with the ethereal suppleness of silk. I think, too, of the rivers that creep into her work: the Chattahoochee, the Hudson, the Creuse, San Francisco Bay, soon the Seine...

I tell myself that they hold one of René’s secrets: doesn’t flowing water dialogue with stone and concrete, just as wind and light converse with her buildings? For this might be the utopia she reveals: a life in which the places we inhabit might themselves yield to movement.

“Toutes voiles dedans” – all sails turned within, veiling the interior. Not an escape to the outer existence, but an interior freedom kept alive in her spirit – and in her suitcase.

— Christina Chirouze Montenegro, curator

Artist’s Statement

“Searching for the meaning in everyday experience, I highlight the details of our lives through the architecture and spaces of cities and countryside. Living with one foot in two countries—France and the United States—I share the perspective of an outsider looking in.

In my previous life, I was gallery and library director at the landscape architecture and historic preservation department at the University of Georgia, Athens, GA, and know that my experiences there led to a deeper understanding of why people are attracted to certain places, and why some spaces feel protective and welcoming.

My research lies here.

As a contemporary artist, I paint primarily on silk—a support that moves, radiates light, and feels alive. The colors of the dyes on the silk are brilliant and bold. The translucence of the silk is mesmerizing. My designs are strong and often tend towards abstraction. I work in many sizes, from intimate small formats to expansive and large artworks.

I love what I do.”

— René Shoemaker, August 31st 2025