Three University of Dayton professors took a break from the classroom and traveled across the globe to grow as artists and as teachers.

Now they want to show UD what they have learned and created.

Visual arts professors Brother Gary Marcinowski, Fred Niles and Jayne Whitaker will exhibit new work created during their sabbaticals now through Jan. 28 in the Rike Center Gallery.

In order to be qualified to take a sabbatical, professors must teach at UD for at least seven years.

"The work they created while they were on sabbatical was an assimilation of their ideas from the past seven years before and research done by all of them while on sabbatical," said Dr. Judith Huacuja, an associate art professor.

Whitaker used her time on sabbatical to visit a site that had a deep family history for her, the exhibit's press release said.

She viewed her research project as a "creative process [that] visually reflects, through iconographic reference, tradition and ritual, the comfort and loss of a place," Whitaker said in the press release.

Niles also decided to take a sabbatical after he spent eight years as the chair of the art department.

"It was about observation," Niles said. "It was about getting back to some creative outlook and observation and then recording what I found out there ... and to bring that rekindled interest back to teaching."

Niles traveled to New Zealand where he visited design colleges.

He also traveled to Scotland, as well as the southeast and west coasts of the United States where he photographed landscapes and water.

When he wasn't traveling, he spent his time in Michigan.

"This sabbatical was principally for photography with hopes to carry over to my teaching in graphic design ... then to get back to being involved in creative research and create a body of work that I could exhibit," he said.

Marcinowski went on sabbatical for one year and took a different approach.

He spent time in Japan, experiencing spiritual traditions and burial practices, and the United States, where he studied the architecture of Frank Lloyd Wright.

"I was at an age that it was an important time; why not take a year off," Marcinowski said. "I was just at the point that I needed to do that."