Mississippi Museum of Art Announces Featured in the 2023 Mississippi Invitational

The Mississippi Museum of Art today announced 15 artists participating in the 2023 Mississippi Invitational exhibition, a survey of recent works created by contemporary visual artists living and working in the state. The exhibition will feature works across a variety of media by the following artists:

• Adrienne Brown-David, Water Valley

• Kwasi Butler, Brandon

• Brenden Davis, Jackson

• Adrienne Domnick, Jackson

• Rory Doyle, Cleveland

• Kariann Fuqua, Oxford

• Caroline Hatfield, Starkville

• Monica Hill, Jackson

• Sabrina Howard, Jackson

• James Kane, Water Valley

• Taylor Loftin, Water Valley

• Robin Martéa, Jackson

• M. Robyn Wall, Cleveland

• Hannah Wegner, Perkinston

• Brooke White, Oxford

On view June 10 through September 17, 2023, this year’s Mississippi Invitational works were selected by guest curator Katie Pfohl, Associate Curator of Contemporary Art at the Detroit Institute of Arts.

“I am thrilled to work with the wonderful team at the Mississippi Museum of Art to create the 2023 Mississippi Invitational,” said Pfohl. From my seven years as a curator in New Orleans, I know the talent, depth, and thoughtfulness of artists in the Gulf South. I am honored to have this opportunity to continue a dialogue with artists from the region, and craft a project that responds to this moment in Mississippi’s history.”

The art in this year’s Invitational reflects on the theme “Gulfs Among Us,” which confronts a world marked by social, political, cultural, and geographic divisions. The artwork in this exhibition responds to a series of ever-widening gulfs: between people and communities, humans and the environment, and our interior and exterior selves. These 15 artists from across Mississippi are united in envisioning how art can speak across and between divides.

Invitational artists will be eligible to apply for The Jane Crater Hiatt Artist Fellowship—a grant of up to $20,000 awarded to one artist. The recipient will be announced during an opening reception on June 8.

MMA Director Betsy Bradley said, “I continue to be excited and inspired by the artists in our state. The 2023 Mississippi Invitational, the thirteenth iteration of this exhibition series, will bring audiences together across our many divides. We are grateful to these artists to allow our community to feel more connected to each other.”

A publication accompanying the exhibition will be available in The Museum Store.

The Mississippi Invitational and its biennial exhibition, artist fellowship, and catalog are made possible with support from the Community Foundation for Mississippi/Jane Crater Hiatt Fund.

About Katie Pfohl

Katie A. Pfohl is a curator and writer who works to amplify the voices of artists, foster connections between communities, and create space to engage with the urgent issues of our time. Since July 2022, she has served as Associate Curator of Contemporary Art at the Detroit Institute of Arts. She was previously Curator of Modern and Contemporary Art at the New Orleans Museum of Art. Some of her major projects included Mending the Sky (2020), which featured eleven artists responding to a world in distress, Bodies of Knowledge (2019), which invited artists to reflect on questions surrounding monuments and memory, Ear to the Ground (2019), which explored environmental activism in contemporary art, and Changing Course: Reflections on New Orleans Histories (2018), which focused on forgotten or marginalized histories of the city. In 2014, Pfohl completed her Ph.D. in art history at Harvard University, and in 2006 she participated in the Whitney Independent Study Program in New York. Pfohl has also held positions at the Philadelphia Museum of Art, the Metropolitan Museum of Art, the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, and the LSU Museum of Art.

About the Jane Crater Hiatt Artist Fellowship

The Jane Crater Hiatt Artist Fellowship was created in 2005 by Jane Crater Hiatt and her late husband Wood (1930-2010) in response to the need to nurture and invigorate the arts within the state. The fellowship provides support to an individual artist in the development and creation of art over a two-year period. The funds may be used to purchase supplies and equipment, conduct research, or travel, and may be used for study with an individual artist or in a studio, workshop, or residency setting. Following the conclusion of the grant period, the artist is required to donate one original work of art, chosen from at least five works created during the grant period, to the Museum. Only artists whose work is selected for inclusion in the Mississippi Invitational exhibition are eligible to apply for the Fellowship in the year that their work is chosen. The recipient’s works should demonstrate the potential for significant artistic and cultural impact, as well as act as a catalyst for the development and realization of adventurous and imaginative ideas. The Jane Crater Hiatt Artist Fellowship is made possible by the Community Foundation for Mississippi/Jane Crater Hiatt Fund.