Kimball Art Center

Park City, Utah Art Center

Artist in Residence – Nancy E. Rivera

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A Kick-off Party will be held on July 8, 2022. 

The Kimball Art Center names Nancy E. Rivera as 2022 artist-in-residence. Kimball Art Center’s artist-in-residence program supports artists of diverse ages, backgrounds, and disciplines in the exploration and expansion of their creative practices and the production of new bodies of work. 

During this residency, Rivera will work on her cross-stitch portrait series and the research behind it. The continuation of that work is a total of 15 self-portraits that trace Rivera’s path through the US immigration process. The source material for this work draws from her family’s archive, which includes government-issued immigration documents from 22 years living as immigrants in the U.S. In this ongoing series of work, Rivera employs passport, green card, and other ID photos to trace the different chapters of her experience through the US immigration process. She reproduces these photos as detailed and delicate cross-stitched portraits.
 
Taking these photos out of the context of their use as government identification transforms and subverts the traditional readings of these images. A reference to the bureaucratic process of immigration remains but in each portrait, as we stare straight ahead, emotionless, devoid of the context of our location, nationality, or legal status I ask the source material to code-switch from its original context to works of art that explore a diasporic identity. 
– Bio
Nancy E. Rivera is a visual artist, curator, and arts administrator based in Salt Lake City, Utah. As an artist, she works primarily in the fields of photography, video, sculpture, and installation. Her practice is influenced by her dual cultural identity and its effects, such as code-switching, cultural assimilation, and displacement. Her most recent work reflects on her experience as first-generation Mexican American through her own history of migration. She has exhibited nationally in a variety of traditional and non-traditional venues and her work is part of private and public collections. From 2018–2021, she served as board member and vice-chair of the Salt Lake City Art Design Board. She was a 2021 National Association of Latino Arts and Cultures (NALAC) Leadership Institute Fellow and currently oversees the Visual Arts Program at the Utah Division of Arts & Museums.

 

Artist-In-Residence Programming

Rivera’s work will be on display July 1 through August 14 and Rivera plans to hold studio hours 0n-site at Kimball Art Center Fridays and Saturday throughout the residency. Visitors to Kimball Art Center are encouraged to engage in conversation with Rivera while onsite to learn more about her work. Additional programming will be announced in the coming weeks. 

Wasatch Back Student Art Show: My Family

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Exhibition Opening Thursday, April 7 from 4:00 to 6:00 p.m.

Kimball Art Center (KAC) is pleased to present the annual Wasatch Back Student Art Show featuring work by students in Summit and Wasatch County Schools, grades K-12. This year’s exhibition will focus in particular on artwork that incorporates the theme of MY FAMILY.

The Wasatch Back Student Art Show is Kimball Art Center’s annual celebration of our community’s youngest artists. All Kindergarten through 12th grade students in Summit and Wasatch counties are invited to participate, creating work around a common theme. This year’s theme, inspired by the work of Maia Cruz Palileo, is about our families. The unfettered imagination of these highly skilled and creative students produces artworks that are both revealing and thought-provoking. 
 
MY FAMILY poses multiple questions: When you think of family, who and where do you think of? What do you know about your family history? What are the stories that are passed from generation to generation in your family? How do these stories help to form a sense of belonging and identity? Which stories are told, and which are not? How do our bodies carry and tell these stories of our families? Are there common or symbolic images of your culture that you would want to deconstruct (take apart, either literally or symbolically)? Think about how you could create a new way of portraying and showing your ancestors, your family, and your culture.

This year’s exhibition will be presented in tandem with additional exhibitions, featuring work by Maia Cruz Palileo, among others.

 

Maia Cruz Palileo, Wind, Water, Stone, 2020. Oil on canvas, 48 x 124 inches. Courtesy of the San Jose Museum of Art. Museum purchase with funds provided by Tad J. Freese and Brook Hartzell, the Lipman Family Foundation, and Yvonne and Mike Nevens, in honor of Cheryl and Bruce Kiddoo. 2021.01

 

Maia Cruz Palileo is a Brooklyn, New York-based artist who paints images of a new and celebratory narrative of growing up as a Filipinx-American in the United States. They blend historical Philippiniana stories with memories of their own family’s migration from the Philippines. Palileo’s exploration of their identity and the connection to the identity of the Philippines in a global context, manifests in rich and colorful works that evoke respect for all of the subjects. In doing so, Palileo presents a reclamation of their peoples from historical colonialism and re-imagines her own cultural heritage. Their focus on identity is based on their viewpoint that our bodies act as vessels, bridging the past to the present.

Artwork Submission

Eligibility and Theme

The show is open to all K-12 students residing in or attending public, private, charter, or home schools in Summit and Wasatch counties. Artwork should follow the theme of MY FAMILY in order to be exhibited. This year’s theme may be taken in many directions, and we encourage lots of creativity! 

Participants may submit only ONE ENTRY. The entry must be an original two- or three-dimensional work created during the 2021-22 school year. The artwork does not, however, need to be the result of a class assignment. Artwork must be ready to exhibit. All two-dimensional work will preferably be framed and must be wired for hanging. KAC is not responsible for any damage rendered to an entry.

Delivery

Artwork must be dropped off at Kimball Art Center March 19–27, 2022. Late entries will not be included. Both sections of the entry form must be completed. Section 1 should be attached to the submitted piece of artwork. Section 2 will be given to the Visitor Services team. We will use the information provided to create exhibition labels, so please make all information legible. Email addresses and phone numbers of students, parents, or teachers are required so that we can ensure the ability to return work to students.

Retrieving Artwork

Artwork must be picked up May 3–8, 2022. If alternate arrangements need to be made for pick-up, KAC must by notified before May 8, 2022. If not retrieved, artwork will become the property of KAC as of May 9, 2022.

For more information, please contact: Nancy Stoaks, Curator, nancy.stoaks@kimballartcenter.org