ARCADE ARTS
SELECTION PANEL
DONNA WOODLEY
Donna Woodley is a visual artist and art educator who maintains her studio practice in Nashville, TN. She was named Nashville’s Best New Artist in 2016 by the Nashville Scene’s annual “Best Of” issue. She was a featured artist for the Representative John Lewis Mural project installed in downtown Nashville, TN in 2021. Donna has exhibited nationally and internationally. Her achievements include the award-winning group exhibition We Count: First Time Voters at The Frist Art Museum in Nashville, TN, and a solo exhibition at the Nashville International Airport. She has commissioned works included in the 2nd and 3rd classes of Vanderbilt University’s Trailblazers Initiative collection in addition to works included in the Margaret Cuninggim Women’s Center collection.
Donna’s work explores themes of black significance, black presence, and black navigation within American spaces. Informed by stereotypes, cultural similarities and differences, perceptions of beauty, mental and physical health, and esteem, her conceptual work often includes symbols and subtle humor as a tool to open the door for honest discourse.
SUSAN TINNEY
Susan Tinney is the founder of Tinney Contemporary Gallery. Tinney Contemporary was established on 5th Avenue in downtown Nashville in 2006 during the initial emergence of galleries to what is now known as the Downtown Arts District. Susan Tinney founded the gallery after spending many years hosting pop-up exhibitions across Nashville. The gallery was established on the ground floor of the historic Kress building, where it is still located today. Since then, Susan Tinney and her gallery have been involved with the growing art scene across Nashville, including helping establish First Saturday Art Crawl in 2006 which now draws hundreds of art enthusiasts and collectors. The gallery currently represents a diverse network of established artists from across the globe and continues to operate at its original location in downtown Nashville.
JOHN PAUL KESLING
John Paul Kesling (b. 1980, USA) was born and raised in Northeastern Kentucky in the foothills of the Appalachian Mountains. He received his BFA in Arts from Morehead State University (Morehead, KY, 2003) and spent a summer in Europe studying art history (Summer, 2002). He went on to receive an MFA in Painting from The Savannah College of Art and Design (Savannah, GA, 2010). He spent the next six years in Brooklyn, NY immersed in the NYC art scene. In March of 2016, he relocated to Madison, TN, just outside of Nashville.
His work has been featured in numerous national print and online publications, in group exhibitions and in permanent collections of The Savannah College of Art and Design (Atlanta, GA and Lacoste, France), Vanderbilt University Medical Center Community Arts Initiative and Soho House Nashville.
He has attended several artist residencies, stateside and abroad, and has had solo shows at Red Arrow Gallery, The Ellis Gallery, Wheelhouse Arts (Louisville, KY), and Oz Arts (Nashville, TN).
Kesling is a member of the artist collective at Ground Floor Contemporary (Birmingham, AL) and is represented by The Red Arrow Gallery (Nashville, TN) and Wheelhouse Art (Louisville, KY).
LANIE GANNON
Lanie Gannon’s current focus is in making paper-based art installations, a creative endeavor explored through engagement in various artist residencies and her studio in Nashville, Tennessee. A recipient of National Endowment for the Arts and two Tennessee Arts Commission Fellowships, Lanie taught sculpture at Belmont University for 18 years, co-founded Nashville Lost Boys of Sudan Foundation, and creates public art for children’s hospitals and schools. She authored Nom de Plume and Book of Ruby, both funded by Tennessee State Museum, with her work featured in Scratching the Surface and The Penland Book of Woodworking.
MICHAEL EWING
Houston-born artist and curator Michael Ewing, a graduate of Fisk University, gained international experience in Paris, curating for the BackSlash gallery. This ignited his passion for global cultural intersections, leading to projects in South Africa and Matanzas, Cuba. His focus on Pan-Africanism, Cultural Capital, and placemaking resonates in his work, weaving together memory, imagination, and identity.
Rooted in the creative artistic consciousness of the South, Ewing’s practice explores folklore, cultural memory, and speculative futures. Now back in Nashville, he continues to shape dialogues celebrating cultural diversity as Associate Curator at the Frist Art Museum.
Photo credit: LeXander Bryant/ Archive South
