Coconino Center for the Arts

EQUUS: The Horse Rendered in Contemporary Art
2023-07-08 - 2023-09-03 | Coconino Center for the Arts, 2300 North Fort Valley Road, Flagstaff, AZ, 86001, United States
TANNER JENSEN, RON TOAHANI JACKSON, & KATHY TAYLOR
July 8 – September 2, 2023
Opening Reception: July 8

Members’ Preview: 5-6 pm
Artist Gallery Talks: 6 pm
Public Reception: 6-8 pm

Closing Reception: September 2, 6-8 pm
EQUUS: The Horse Rendered in Contemporary Art aims to transcend conventions of Western American art, placing the viewer in a liminal space to contemplate the threshold between traditional depictions and contemporary perspectives. Equus (Latin term for horse) brings together the creative work of three accomplished artists—Tanner Jensen, Ron Toahani Jackson, and Kathy Taylor—who share a kinship of mutual respect with, and admiration for, the horse: free and unbridled in spirit and form.
Tanner Jensen (Greenville, North Carolina). Jensen has been enthralled with horses since she was a child; since then, they have served as a muse, the source of inspiration for her creative practice. “It’s a mystery to me why the horse lends itself to my search for understanding, but it does. Through these animals, I have learned to be a much better human being. They’ve taught me patience, given me lessons about life and death, lead me through grief, and are a constant reminder to stay present and to delight in this miracle of a world” (tannerjensenfineart.com). Before moving to North Carolina, Jensen was a resident of Flagstaff intermittently since 1976.
Ron Toahani Jackson (Tségháhoodzání or Window Rock, Navajo Nation, Arizona). Toahani is an artist, photographer and animal rights activist working to preserve the last free wild roaming horses on his ancestral lands. The artist describes the intimate experiences he has with the wild horses that inspire his work: “When you sit in the landscape with the horses, they will come up and surround you. They get close, just a few feet from you. They are spiritual; it is a spiritual experience.” Toahani’s monotypes are one-of-a-kind ink or painted images, created on a substrate and transferred to a paper surface, oftentimes embellished with additional pencil marks or textures. Toahani’s videography of wild horses is displayed on the exterior of Coconino Center for the Arts during evening viewing events.
Kathy Taylor (Phoenix, Arizona). Taylor reflects on the development of the horse as a reoccurring motif and as part of her intuitive approach to mixed-media painting and sculpture: “When the first horse emerged in one of my paintings, it was no surprise to find out that these beautiful symbols of strength, freedom, and power were just what I needed at the time. Horse had chosen me! While I paint, the horses meet me in that place where the invisible world meets visible reality bringing with them messages of hope and healing” (Voyage Phoenix, October 18, 2018). Taylor attributes her abstract artistic influences on her formative years living in Southern California in the 1960s.

DAWN KISH: TAD’S EMERGING WORLD: GLEN CANYON EXPOSED
2023-09-02 19:00 (America/Phoenix)
PHOTOGRAPHY AND FILM BY DAWN KISH
Closing Reception: September 2nd
Join us on Saturday, September 2nd for the closing reception of Tad’s Emerginng World: Glen Canyon Exposed photography & film by Dawn Kish. The evening will include a screening of Kish’s film Tad’s Emerging World which world premiered at the Banff Film Festival and US premiere at the Telluride Mountainfilm. The film screening will be followed by an artist talk and Q&A with Kish who will be joined by her assistance Cierra Murrietta to give more behind the scenes details. The event will conclude with music from Julie Sullivan & Friends who will perform a variety of original and historic river songs from various regions in America including from our own beloved Colorado Plateau. Julie brings a lifetime of devotion to music in all its gorgeous and healing forms to the stage to complement the exhibition, “Tad’s Emerging World: Glen Canyon Exposed”, a profound and historically significant work by Dawn Kish.

DARCY FALK: Regarding Privilege
2023-09-23 - 2023-11-03
Opening Reception: Saturday, September 23
Members Preview 5-6 pm
Public Reception 6-8 pm
Artist Talk: October 17, 6:30 pm
DARCY FALK: REGARDING PRIVILEGE
SEPTEMBER 23 – NOVEMBER 2, 2023
In Regarding Privilege, Falk exhibits embroidered artworks that address white privilege by exhibiting the backside of the embroideries as the primary message. Each embroidery is accompanied by a mirror, so that the words can be read over the shoulder of the viewer, with their back turned toward the message. The embroidered quotes are by prominent Black politicians, writers, activists, and others, and are rendered in the artist’s handwriting using embroidery on cloth.
Image credit: Darcy Falk | Blue cloud cloth, Langston Hughes | 2020 | embroidered textile | 20” x 24”

TOM KIEFER: El Sueño Americano
2023-09-23 - 2023-12-24
Opening Reception: Saturday, September 23
Members Preview 5-6 pm
Tom Kiefer in Conversation with Liz Allen 6 – 6:30 pm
Public Reception 6-8
TOM KIEFER: EL SUEÑO AMERICANO / THE AMERICAN DREAM
SEPTEMBER 23 – DECEMBER 23, 2023
Tom Kiefer: El Sueño Americano / The American Dream is a photographic documentation of the personal belongings carried by migrants and those seeking asylum that were seized by U.S. Customs and Border Protection at a processing facility near the artist’s home in Ajo, Arizona, about 40 miles from the U.S./Mexico border. U.S. border agents deemed these belongings as non-essential or potentially lethal. Kiefer asks the viewer to consider these photographs as untold and unknown stories, markers of human journeys cut short, creating a personal connection for the viewer that extends compassion and empathy to those who make the dangerous journey across the desert to seek a better life.
