KCAI Gallery: Center for Contemporary Practice

KCAI GALLERY: Center for Contemporary Practice

Launched in 2016 in the Crossroads District and relocated to the Tony Jones Studios on the main campus, the KCAI Gallery: Center for Contemporary Practice serves the mission of KCAI through collaborative, curriculum-based engagements with students, faculty, community and artists in residence. Our new campus gallery presents curatorial outcomes of these engagements that include exhibitions, screenings, lectures, readings, and conversations. This site and related programs hold space for critical thought, reflection, and dialog about current social issues and global challenges in our world.

The KCAI Gallery will continue to work closely with all departments and explore new community partnerships. Our prime location will help facilitate a collaborative, integrated space for KCAI students and offer the public a new destination nestled between the Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, Kemper Museum of Contemporary Art and the H&R Block Artspace.

Current EXHIBITION

Soundings: An Exhibition in Five Parts

August 18 – October 30, 2022

Curated by Candice Hopkins and Dylan Robinson
Tour Organized by Independent Curators International (ICI)

How can a score be a call and tool for decolonization?

Curated by Candice Hopkins and Dylan Robinson, Soundings: An Exhibition in Five Parts features newly commissioned scores, performances, videos, sculptures and sound by Indigenous and other artists who respond to this question. Unfolding in a sequence of five parts, the scores take the form of beadwork, videos, objects, graphic notation, historical belongings, and written instructions. During the exhibition these scores are activated at specific moments by musicians, dancers, performers and members of the public, gradually filling the gallery and surrounding public spaces with sound and action.

The exhibition is cumulative, limning an ever-changing community of artworks, shared experience and engagement as it travels. Soundings shifts and evolves, gaining new artists and players in each location. Some artworks have multiple parts, others change to their own rhythm as the exhibition grows.

At the core of the exhibition is a grounding in concepts of Indigenous land and territory. To move beyond the mere acknowledgement of land and territory here means offering instructions for sensing and listening to Indigenous histories that trouble the colonial imaginary. Soundingsactivates and asserts Indigenous resurgence through the actions these artworks call forth.

Artists:
Raven Chacon and Cristóbal Martínez, Sebastian De Line, Camille Georgeson-Usher, Kite, Germaine Koh, Aaron Leon, Tanya Lukin Linklater, Logan MacDonald, Chandra Melting Tallow, Ogimaa Mikana, Peter Morin, Diamond Point and Jordan Point, Taylor Jordan Riner, Heidi Senungetuk, Greg Staats, Olivia Whetung, and Tania Willard, with more performers, artists and composers invited to respond and create new works as the exhibition travels to each new venue.

Public Reception:
Friday, August 26, 5 – 8 p.m.

reserve a free ticket

Performances

RSVP through the links below.

Thursday, August 18 at 12p.m.
Dó-gah – I don’t know [shrugging shoulders]
by Greg Staats

Friday, September 16
NDN Love Songs, score by Peter Morin performed.

Friday, September 23
Surrounded/Surrounding, score by Tania Willard performed.

Friday, September 30
Listener, performance by the artist, Kite.

Thursday, October 13
Surrounded/Surrounding, score by Tania Willard performed.

Wednesday, October 26
American Ledger (no. 1), score by Raven Chacon performed. Paul Rudy, Conductor.

Thursday, October 27
Public lecture by Raven Chacon at the Nerman Museum of Contemporary Art.

Soundings: An Exhibition in Five Parts is an exhibition curated by Candice Hopkins and Dylan Robinson, and organized by Agnes Etherington Art Centre, Queen’s University, Canada. The traveling exhibition is organized by Independent Curators International (ICI). The exhibition and tour are made possible, in part, with the generous support from ICI’s International Forum and the ICI Board of Trustees. Additional support has been provided by the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada, the Canada Council for the Arts’ New Chapter Program, the Isabel and Alfred Bader Fund of Bader Philanthropies, the Ontario Arts Council, the City of Kingston Arts Fund through the Kingston Arts Council, and the George Taylor Richardson Memorial Fund at Queen’s University.

Additional support at KCAI comes from The Gattermeir Family Foundation, Travois, Sharon and John Hoffman and Linda Lighton. Other supporters through performance and academic partnerships include the Nerman Museum of Contemporary Art at Johnson County Community College, the Tulsa Artist Fellowship and The Patricia and Howard Barr Institute for American Composition Studies at UMKC. A special thanks to Gaylene Crouser and the Kansas City Indian Center, Bruce Hartman, Bill Sundahl, Davin Watne, Paul Rudy, Dr. Robert Warrior, Dr. Alex Red Corn, Braxton Redeagle and the Osage Nation Language Department, and Sonié Joi Thompson-Ruffin.

Visitors Guide

KCAI Gallery is open to the public with free timed-entry tickets. To protect the well-being of visitors and the KCAI community, the Gallery will limit the number of guests.

Hours
Thursday | noon – 5 p.m.
Friday | noon – 5 p.m.
Saturday | noon – 5 p.m.
Sunday | noon – 5 p.m
Other days by appointment, email gallery@kcai.edu.

Wayfinding
Protect yourself and others: maintain a safe distance of 6’ between you and other guests, use the designated entrance and exit, and follow the designated path that leads you through the exhibition. The path through the galleries is marked with arrows.

Masks
For your safety and ours, KCAI requires all individuals on campus to wear a mask during their visits. Please wear your mask both inside and outside of campus buildings. If you find yourself without one, KCAI and the gallery have a limited supply for visitors.

Cleanliness
Surfaces are sanitized throughout the day and hand sanitizer is available at the front desk.

Questions
You can email us at gallery@kcai.edu if you have questions or need to make special arrangements for your visit.

Public Online Programs
The KCAI Gallery is excited to engage artists and audiences in new ways through a series of online programs. Please register for these programs here!