The Harrison Center will launch six exhibitions spanning painting, collage, cultural identity and healing during its October First Friday celebration. The free event takes place Friday, October 2, from 6 to 9 p.m., inviting visitors to explore galleries throughout the center while enjoying local vendors and food.

In the Harrison Gallery, Jay Parnell presents Dust, a collection of oil paintings on wood panels that serves as a meditation on human ephemerality. The exhibition considers how people exist in a continual state of shedding and becoming, intimately connected to the debris they often try to sweep away. By making the invisible visible, Parnell reframes dust as a poetic archive of existence and a quiet monument to the passage of time.

The City Gallery will feature Tending by Morgan Binkerd. In her latest body of work, Binkerd reflects on the creative process of building a life, drawing connections between her personal journey in Indianapolis and her artistic practice. Through pieces that include paintings on sycamore bark, she examines the often-unseen labor involved in nurturing life and the acts of care and transformation found in both nature and creativity.

Yasha Persson brings humor, history and bargain-bin enlightenment to the Gallery Annex with Inner Peace on a Budget. The two-dimensional collages combine antique illustrations, forgotten typography and weathered fragments of the past to explore the sometimes noble—and sometimes ridiculous—pursuit of spiritual awakening. With scissors and satire, Persson suggests that illumination may not require a golden temple.

In the Speck Gallery, LAHI: Weaving Filipino American Stories in Indiana brings together artists from across the state in recognition of Filipino American History Month. Co-curated by Jingo M. de la Rosa and April Knauber, the group exhibition features new and existing works examining identity, ancestry, immigration, community and cultural preservation. Collectively, the artists convey the complexity, resilience and joy of the Filipino American experience.

The Underground Gallery will host a CompleteLife group exhibition featuring artwork created by caregivers, patients and staff members of the IU Health Simon Cancer Center. Each piece tells part of its artist’s personal journey while demonstrating the ability of art to foster healing, understanding and human connection.

In the Sky Gallery, Indianapolis artist Quincy Owens presents Remnants and Fractures. The show combines two contrasting bodies of work: stark black-and-white resin pieces and a collection of vivid paintings. By placing the works in conversation with one another, Owens explores how the brain’s left and right hemispheres can operate both together and independently while finding beauty within fractures, faults and imperfections.

Beyond the galleries, visitors can stop by the Historic Gymnasium to browse a variety of literary-themed vendors preparing for Indiana Humanities’ Proof: A Midwest Lit Fest. The Garnacha Spot food truck will also serve street food across the courtyard throughout the evening.

All six exhibitions open at 6 p.m. on October 2. Following First Friday, visitors can tour the galleries in person Monday through Friday from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. Special Senior Hours are offered every Friday from 2 to 4 p.m., with no appointment required.

Online versions of the exhibitions will open October 6. To schedule a gallery visit or browse available artwork, visit harrisoncenter.org/buy-art