Category: 2017 Artist

Kevin Benham is an Assistant Professor of Landscape Architecture in the School of Design at South Dakota State University. He received his MLA from the Graduate School of Design at Harvard University and his M.Arch. at the Taubman College of Architecture and Urban Planning, The University of Michigan. His research and work focuses on landscape phenomena and the temporal qualities inherent in the discipline. To that end, he produces temporal and ephemeral installations that elucidate phenomena requiring careful observation through space and time.

Being of Native America descent, while growing up in the Ozark hills formed an interesting narrative in my self-identity. Story-telling has always been an important part of both cultures. In my study of Ozarkian and Native lore I’ve come to find common threads and motives; different versions of the same story. Through the study of nature, history and folklore, I use recycled materials from my environment to create sculpture, photographs and performances that investigate my impact on the natural world and my place between two interwoven cultures.

Cody Kauhl is a composer and multimedia artist that pairs found sound and video with the intimacy of the human voice. He is currently artist-in-residence at the Charlotte Street Foundation Studio Residency Program. Cody graduated in 2011 with a B.M. in Music Theory/Composition at Southern Illinois University Edwardsville and received his M.M. in Music Composition at the University of Missouri – Kansas City in 2015.

Lynn Benson was born not far from the Atlantic Ocean and raised in the US heartland. She left the corporate world in 2010 in order to work full-time as an artist in the Kansas City region. Her work explores the meandering lines of rivers and shorelines worldwide, and the delicate balancing act of our current natural and political world.

Corey Smith is a composer, writer, and performer living and working in Chicago, Illinois. He is classically trained, but is interested in an art that obscures the boundaries between worlds: words that are sound, music that is image, body that is text.

Abbey Blake creates work through the lens of a maker but also an explorer. There is an invaluable connection between her time in the studio and time spent observing the natural world. There is typically an aspect of cherishing phenomenon, but also an appreciation of the ecosystem and the less observable species that make a bionetwork what it is. Blake received her BFA in Printmaking from the Cleveland Institute of Art in 2014 and is currently an MFA candidate in Printmaking at The University of Iowa.

Steve Snell calls his work adventure art. He is inspired by local history, myths, and the image of the American west in an effort to create heroic narratives for the present day. Steve has been an Artist-in-Residence at the Teton ArtLab in Jackson, WY, the Wassaic Project in Wassaic, NY, and along the Chilkoot Trail in Alaska and British Columbia. Steve earned his M.F.A. in Studio Art from the University of Massachusetts Amherst. He currently is an Assistant Professor of Art in the Foundations Department at the Kansas City Art Institute.

Born and raised in Seoul, South Korea, Shin-hee Chin received her BFA and MFA from Hong-Ik University. Shortly after, she immigrated to the United States with her husband and raised two kids while earning her MA in Fiber Arts from California State University at Long Beach. For 14 years, Chin has taught at Tabor College in Hillsboro, Kansas. Her work has been exhibited nationally and internationally, including at the Textile Museum in Washington, DC and the Palais des Nations (United Nations’ headquarters building) in Geneva, Switzerland.