Threshold Gallery
On view April 8 - June 28, 2024
(Left to right) program facilitator Isabel Arevalo, TALC participants Lynda Acosta, Boniat Ephrem, Meher Khan, Zamara Cuyún, Whitney Terrill, and program facilitator Nancy Ariza
Reflected Impressions, Endless Possibilities features the new work by members of Highpoint’s Teaching Artist Learning Community (TALC), including Lynda Acosta, Constanza Carballo, Zamara Cuyún, Boniat Ephrem, Meher Khan, and Whitney Terrill. Th prints in this exhibition draw inspiration from personal teaching philosophies and reflections on participating in TALC.
About TALC: TALC is a paid program for early-career Minnesota-based BIPOC artists interested in growing their teaching and studio practice in printmaking. Over 10 weeks, the cohort met weekly with Nancy Ariza, Highpoint’s Artist Education Programs Manager and Isabel Arevalo, Teen and Adult Programs Intern, for printmaking instruction and discussions on pedagogy and professional practice skills of being a teaching artist in order to develop their own printmaking workshops. Additional engagements included visiting Mia’s Print Study Room to expand their knowledge of contemporary printmakers, and meeting guest artist and educator, Melodee Strong who shared feedback on their teaching philosophy statements and professional advice. This spring the cohort members will be leading their workshops between February and May at Highpoint and offsite at partner organizations.
About the Artists:
Lynda Acosta is a visual artist from Colombia whose artistic work has inspired her to create various workshops to share her knowledge about linocuts and engage in conversations about environmental and social issues. She received the Creative Response Fund 2023 grant for EnVulvArte, a project to create art and a safe space for Latina women to reconnect with their bodies.
Constanza Carballo turns acrylic paintings, murals, linocuts into voice pieces that highlight the marginalized. Inspired by her own bicultural and bilingual upbringing as an immigrant in the south Minneapolis Philips community, Constanza began painting murals at the age of 13 and has since been recognized as a statement maker. She has brought fellow women artists together internationally and locally through community events that bring attention to the inequalities women face in all sectors of society including economic, political, workforce, healthcare, and education.
Zamara Cuyún is a self-taught Guatemalan-American artist and educator based in Minneapolis. As a painter, she grounds her work in Maya history, iconography, and worldview. As a teaching artist, she believes that making art can be a powerful tool for processing and expressing our identities, histories and memories through intergenerational storytelling and maintaining ancestral connection.
Boniat Ephrem is an Oromo-American artist based in Minneapolis, Minnesota. As she builds her artistic practice, Boniat centers the belief that art allows us to connect to the world, each other, our history, and ourselves in interesting ways. She seeks to investigate, experiment, and playfully create around those nuanced connections.
Meher Khan is a multimedia artist with training in printmaking, graphic design, and communications. She is a 2024 candidate for the Minneapolis College of Art and Design’s Master of Fine Arts program, and works as a graduate teaching assistant with MCAD faculty. Her current studio practice centers around identity and her second generation American experience.
Whitney Terrill is a multidisciplinary Minnesota-based artist focusing primarily on printmaking, photography, and painting. In her work, she addresses topics important to her, such as environmental justice and African heritage. Whitney also enjoys engaging in public art, especially murals, to raise awareness about environmental justice and to facilitate community meals and engagement for placemaking and placekeeping.
This activity is made possible by the voters of Minnesota through a grant from the Minnesota State Arts Board, thanks to a legislative appropriation from the arts and cultural heritage fund.