Betsy Stirratt feels your pain. "Parking on campus is very frustrating," she agrees. And while she's not exactly proposing that anyone break any laws, the IU School of Fine Arts (SoFA) Gallery director did recently say -- out loud -- that, "Many people find they don't get ticketed on Friday nights when they park in the main library lot, probably because a lot of events are happening on those evenings."

Opening receptions for the SoFA Gallery exhibitions, featuring works of students and faculty, as well as that of regional and national visual artists, for example, tend to be held on Friday nights. With a slew of provocative exhibitions on the horizon, Stirratt would like to see more folks from the community visiting the SoFA Gallery, for Friday receptions and otherwise, even if that means maneuvering around parking headaches and the invisible but daunting divide, that in the imaginations of many, segregates the townies from the gownies.

In 1962, the view that anything could be art was at its peak in the art world. Artists would use unconventional materials -- metal scraps, buttons, cardboard -- whatever they thought would express their ideas best.

In that same year, the Indiana University Art Museum (IUAM) received four works of art that fell into this category. These works, including one other piece received in a different year, are on display as part of the IUAM's "New in the Galleries" exhibition titled The Art of Assemblage.

Ned Puchner, a graduate student in art history and the curatorial assistant for Western Art after 1800, prepared the exhibition. It was partially inspired by the New York Museum of Modern Art's 1961 Art of Assemblage exhibition. He said the works are "an excellent group, indicative of the range of works categorized under the terms 'neo-Dada' or 'assemblage'."

Sitting at a messy desk inside her tiny office enclosed by curtains, Jaime Sweany laughs at the fake Turtle University diploma that hangs on the wall. The diploma says she is a "Master of Turtles."

Sweany, 49, is the master of turtles at Wandering Turtle in downtown Bloomington. She's no stranger to owning a small business and the challenges that go with it. Before opening the Wandering Turtle in 2003, she owned two other small businesses in Bloomington -- Wild Birds Unlimited and Illuminessence Photography.

"I've never had a real big business," says Sweany. "I owned Wild Birds Unlimited for about seven-and-a-half years. It was still a small business, but it was probably a more established business."

Indiana University Photography Students 10th Annual Alternative Show will feature a collection of portraits celebrating the people who make up the Bloomington community.

The show, which includes the work of the 14 BFA photography students, opens Nov. 30, 7-11 p.m., at Third and Lincoln.

"Everyone is taking 20 photographs of people in the community," says Christina Allegree, who is in her third semester of the B.F.A. program. "There will be around 300 portraits. Last year the show was a community project, but only two people did portraits, so this year we wanted to involve the community more."

At the IU Art Museum’s special exhibitions gallery, two unique exhibits share an emphasis on the artists’ techniques and experimentation with their crafts.

“Sculpture Transformed: The Work of Marjorie Schick” features 67 works of art from the internationally renowned contemporary craft artist Schick, who received her MFA with distinction in jewelry and metalsmithing in 1966 from IU.

“The Second Wave: Modern Japanese Prints from Bloomington Collections” features 40 modern Japanese woodblock prints, including prints from the museum’s collection and some borrowed from local collectors.

On March 28, the IU Art Museum will premier several exciting new exhibitions, with work from Master of Fine Arts candidates in the Henry Radford Hope School of Fine Arts, African artists Tijani Sitou and Kalidou Sy and Venetian draftsman Domenico Tiepolo.

The exhibitions will be on view in the Special Exhibitions Gallery and at the School of Fine Arts (SoFA Gallery) through May 20.

Sandra Abraham, a client of the Center for Behavioral Health, always knew she wanted to paint. But until she finally started four years ago, thanks to encouragement from the center and her friends, she never realized it could be a therapeutic — and affordable — hobby.

"I don't think I realized how much it would help," says Abraham, who'd been discouraged from painting in the past because she thought it would be too expensive. But she soon found that painting was a great release, much like journaling her thoughts, something she's been doing since she was 19.

Now an active participant in the center's art group, her work has been featured in the organization's calendar and all-occasion cards.

Abraham's art will be part of "The Art of Mental Health" exhibit at the Buskirk-Chumley Theater Saturday, Dec. 2. The exhibit, displaying the work of Abraham and other clients at the center, is part of a larger series of events co-sponsored by the Center for Behavioral Health and the Mental Health Alliance (MHA).