For millennia, bells have organized society by tolling to mark the hours, calling communities to assemble, clanging alarms of danger, and ringing in momentous occasions. These cultural connotations are made even more multivalent by the many shapes and styles bells have taken over the centuries. Since 2017, Davina Semo has explored the meanings and artistic potential of this form in resonant sculptures, translating poured molten bronze into a range of textures, shapes, and patterns with an almost infinite variety of paint or patina finishes. This exhibition, the artist’s first solo museum showcase of her bells, features more than 50 works suspended at different heights in groupings that emphasize their polyphony. Together, the bells offer variations on a theme with complex surfaces that reflect their environment and encourage viewers to engage with sculpture in the round. Ultimately, Semo invites us to consider the functional elements of art by experiencing its sonic dimensions. As museum visitors strike the clapper against the shell, their action becomes participation and metaphor simultaneously: we hear the ringing bell vibrate and sense how our gestures reverberate outward toward others. 
Documenting this significant exhibition, while pairing insightful observations on the artist by SCAD Museum of Art chief curator Daniel S. Palmer and Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden curator Anne Reeve, the catalogue delves into Semo’s creative ethos.

Davina Semo: A Gathering of Bells was on view at the SCAD Museum of Art from August 4, 2025 - January 4, 2026. The catalogue is coproduced with Jessica Silverman on the occasion of the artist’s first institutional exhibition. This publication is made possible by the generous support of The Girlfriend Fund. Additional support from Jonathan Gans and Abigail Turin and Kaitlyn and Mike Krieger.