Each year the University of Puget Sound’s (UPS) Kittredge Gallery puts on an exhibition of works by the senior students graduating from the art department. Judging from this year’s “Senior Art Show,” the current crop of art graduates are by and large discontent with the standard formula of art as an image in a rectangle or as an object on a pedestal. The visitor to the gallery space is immediately met by artwork jutting out from the walls, dangling from the ceiling and spilling out onto the floor.

Priscilla Dobler’s “La Nina” is a painting of a fictionalized girl-child of the streets who stands surrounded by birds. The large roll of canvas on which the picture is painted is unfurled - rolling down the wall surface and onto the floor. Cutouts of birds hang from the ceiling and a three-dimensional figure wrapped in strips of canvas lies on the floor like an anguished mummy.

One of Graham Klag’s marine biology-derived paintings features a multi-lobed blob of stuffed, stitched canvas and molding clay that sticks out from the painting’s surface.

Eric Anderson’s “Drop,” a construction of steel with a working light bulb embedded in it, is supported by a cable while his steel sculpture “Support” is fixed to one of the gallery’s support pillars.

Nick Reed’s “Growth II” - a concoction of plaster and steel that resembles a blob of mucus (he claims, actually, to be inspired by mold) - hangs like a bat so high up in the rafters that it is apt to be missed by most visitors.

Margaret Perry’s deftly made kinetic sculptures also dangle from above or sit on little shelves mounted on one of the pillars.

Peter Stanley’s “Command from the Heights” is a wooden wall with an open back where one can see cords of orange electrical wire.

Around the other side there are a series of slots and a plywood podium with a series of red buttons. Each button activates an element of the machinery in the wall. Things clunk or metal bars come thumping out from the slots.

Stanley’s use of raw lumber and electrical wiring is but one example of the use of non-traditional materials in many of the works present. The masterful Perry also uses untreated wood in her fanciful constructions. Her series of whirligigs utilize leaves, flowers, nails, smashed bottle caps, feathers, pennies and little bells. A wall tag advises that these are to be cranked “with enthusiasm.” (Two other pieces by Perry are to be “cranked gently.”) Other examples of non-traditional art media are Anderson’s use of expanding foam on a robotic monstrosity called “Embrace,” and Juliet Shapiro’s use of steel rods and polyurethane molding rubber for her magical, stained-glass-looking sanctuaries.

While some of the artists profess lofty (and possibly unobtainable) goals for their art, others straightforwardly confess that the process of creation is done for the sheer pleasure of it - because it is fun.

The sure-footed Perry is in this camp as is Shapiro. Todd Clancy is perhaps most upfront in doing simply what makes him happy. He has decorated white baseball hats, skateboards and water boards with garish, graffiti-like images in acrylic.

A number of the artists wish to express the influence of family and friends. Ali Vance, for example, in “Connecting Loss” wishes to depict the web of relationships surrounding her grandmother who died of cancer. Five charcoal portraits are placed upon foam board collaged with photographic images of people. Hung irregularly, these are interconnected by greasy, green tendrils that extend from enormous green blobs that are meant to be enlarged cancer cells.

In a more serene vein, Bethany Scinta’s “Identify-Inform-Inspire” consists of 50 photo lithographs of various people who have played a prominent roll in her life. The photo lithographs are done on soft-edged paper and have subtle differences of tinting.

Brit Samms is also influenced by family experience. Samms presents paintings based on family snapshots of childhood outings. A simple, black outline of one of Samms’ brothers is done over a collage of family snapshots (muted by a thin white wash). The line painting is butted up against a more garish scene derived from another snapshot, which is painted in riotous color in expressionistic brush strokes.

Maddy Bassett’s “Coastline Memory” - a set of three vertical canvases executed skillfully in oils - is also derived from the lingering love of family outings to the Pacific Northwest’s coast.

As in all group shows there is variance in the skill level with which each artist uses their materials. Klag is a skilled painter as is Jaime Patneaude, whose butterfly net-wielding male nudes in “Dream Catchers” are a delightful pair of gnomes. Lydia Patterson’s color pencil drawings of blossoms, leaves and twigs are also well executed. Perry’s attention to detail of construction seems particularly adept and Scinta’s photo lithographs also come across as professional.

The 2009 “Senior Art Show” runs through May 15 at Kittredge Gallery on the UPS campus. For further information call (253) 879-2806.