This is a very exciting time for the Arts section of the Mass Media and anybody who’s been to the Campus Center can probably guess why. The Arts on the Point Project just commissioned a new piece of artwork, and students were lucky enough to see it completed step by step.   Two  weeks ago Sheila Pepe and her assistant were lifted via cherry picker to the hair raising height of the third floor of the campus center. For a week they painstakingly wove bright orange shoelaces into an intricate spider web formation, adding a a thick blue towline for dramatic affect.   All of Sheila Pepe’s work is entirely site specific making her work Simple Drawing hanging here at UMB a one of a kind piece. Sheila Pepe’s work is well known and has been the feature of many expositions. Arts on the Point Director Paul Tucker wrote in the label for her piece:   “She has had numerous solo exhibitions at venues throughout the United States including: University Gallery at the University of Massachusetts, Amherst and The Weatherspoon Art Museum, University of North Carolina, Greensboro. Her work has also been featured in numerous group exhibitions including Shared Women, Los Angeles Contemporary Exhibitions, and Radical Lace and Subversive Knitting, Museum of Arts and Design, New York”   Sheila’s choice of materials is very non-traditional and minimalist, using shoelaces,rubber bands and nautical towlines. Her creations are carefully sewn, crocheted, woven, draped, laced, knotted, purposefully tangled together, and the result is a very striking piece of artwork. Tucker describes our particular piece as a unique piece of work that has some truly scintilating features. “Simple Drawing is a contingent structure; it depends entirely on the size and shape of the wall, on the hooks from which it is tied and hung, and on gravity and tension. It also is unique; it exists only when on this wall. Its parts are both separate and interrelated, allowing us to see the work’s manufacture and the artist’s decision-making. The piece points in many directions while leading our eye in intricate patterns, reminding us that even the simple can be complicated just as the transparent can be mysterious. Simple Drawing also calls attention to the age-old clash between factory-made products and hand-made objects. The two are combined here, suggesting an ideal synthesis.  Colorful, playful, and seemingly spontaneous, Simple Drawing is an act of cultural continuation as it relies on the aesthetics of mid-20th century New York Abstraction, 1970s feminist tropes, and late 20th-century installation and performance art.”   What I thought was unique about the project was the fact that you as a passerby had the privilege to see the work as it is being created. We were able to peak behind the canvas, so to speak, and watch the artist’s process just by coming to class everyday.   This work was made possible by the Arts on the Point professors, specifically David Levine, who was in direct communication with the artist and was a big help to the writing of this article.