The Roosevelt Center hosts guest artists in our Rotating Exhibit areas around the building. 

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Our current exhibit features Shan Graf, Echoes of the Self.

 

Echoes of the Self explores the shifting boundaries between reflection and escape. Each painting exists in a charged space where memory, identity, and emotion dissolve and reform—where figures shimmer between real and imagined selves. Working primarily in oil, Shan Graf constructs luminous, psychologically layered scenes that mirror the instability of selfhood. Blending impressionism and realism, Graf’s saturated color fields heighten emotion and abstract reality, transforming moments of vulnerability into dreamlike encounters.

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Created in Montana, this body of work reflects the quiet intensity of making contemporary art within a landscape defined by openness and solitude. The surrounding environment becomes both backdrop and mirror—its vastness amplifying the search for self within. Through painterly experimentation and emotional depth, Echoes of the Self invites viewers into a space of shared reflection—one that embraces fluidity, contradiction, and the quiet drama of being seen.

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Shan Graf creates artwork as a means of both reflection and escape, constructing spaces where memory, identity, and emotion exist in flux. Working primarily in oil paint, he blends impressionism and realism to explore emotional states through vivid, atmospheric color. Shan’s use of saturation heightens memory and abstraction, enabling each piece to transcend fixed narratives.

Influenced by ideas of performative and fluid identity, my work examines the tension between interior and exterior selves. Themes of mental health, personal history, and environment recur throughout my practice, shaped by my upbringing in Montana’s expansive landscape.

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Through painterly experimentation and emotional resonance, I aim to create spaces that invite contemplation and connection—works that mirror the shifting nature of self while contributing to a broader conversation about identity, place, and presence within contemporary art.

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Building hours are 9 am to 5 pm, Monday - Friday. If your are interested in becoming a guest artist, please contact Pat Olding.