Lectures and Talks

Join curator Jill D’Alessandro and the artist’s son, Bill Barton, for a discussion about Nancy Hemenway Barton's artistic influences, practice, and personal history. From 1966 to 1997, Nancy Hemenway Barton, an artist from the Maine coast, created large-scale wall reliefs using hand-loomed fabrics primarily sourced from indigenous weaving communities in South America and Africa, where she had lived and worked.

Doug Salati, author of the award-winning 2022 picture book Hot Dog, began developing the idea for his book during his Sendak Fellowship in 2015. As an archives assistant at the Maurice Sendak Foundation, Salati immersed himself in Sendak’s creative world, studying original sketches, preliminary drawings, and final works. In this lecture, Salati will share behind-the-scenes insights into his creative process, lessons learned from one of the greatest storytellers of our time, and how Sendak’s methodologies continue to inspire his work today.

Shiva Ahmadi orchestrates exquisitely crafted scenes of beauty and terror. Her vibrant fantasy realms are, upon closer inspection, macabre theaters of conflict where faceless figures engage in endless cycles of struggle and pain. Combining luminous colors and mystical beings with violent imagery, Ahmadi creates watercolor paintings, sculptures, and digital animations that illuminate global issues of migration, war, and brutality against marginalized peoples. Her work is informed by current events in the Middle East and the US, and inspired by Iranian, Turkish, and Indian book and miniature painting traditions.

In 2016, Ahmadi received the Anonymous Was A Woman Award and a Pollock-Krasner Foundation Grant. Her work is in the collections of the Asian Art Museum, San Francisco; Dallas Museum of Art; Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York; Museum of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles; and Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts, Philadelphia.

Vance Kirkland, namesake of Kirkland Museum, was a lifelong painter, art educator, and proponent of modernism in Denver, Colorado. His involvement with the University of Denver, Denver Art Museum, and many of Colorado's artists from 1929 to 1981 left a lasting impact on the cultural landscape of our state. Kirkland Museum's merger with the Denver Art Museum is the culmination of almost 100 years of connections. Join us to learn about this visionary artist and his enduring influence.

Maya D. Wright grew up in Denver and has worked at Kirkland Museum of Fine & Decorative Art since 2005, most recently as Director of Interpretation. She is now on staff at the Denver Art Museum, managing the interpretation and communications aspects of the Kirkland integration.