Carmen T. Thompson Gallery


A Tendency Toward Disorder 

Foundations Cohort 5

Life doesn’t stay sorted. Plans scatter, routines fray, messes return.

But entropy is more than disorder, it can also define possibility, transformation, and time. To create, to live, to feel excitement, we spend energy to carve temporary order in a universe that prefers to spread things out.

The works in this exhibit show us how to hold things together, how to let things loosen, and where beauty appears in the in-between. Works that reveal this give-and-take might let layers show through, allow structures to rebalance, trace systems that drift (A.I. we’re watchin you!), or keep repairs visible. A drawing can keep its erasures. A collage can hold both tear and repair. A sculpture can settle or slump.

Treat change as evidence. Change is the story.

This year we celebrate the 5th Anniversary of the Foundations Epilogue Exhibition, featuring artwork created by students in their first-year with the Department of Art and Design. Referred to as the foundations year, majors and minors enter into the department with a variety of previous experience in art making and design. Over the course of the year, students are encouraged to experiment with physical processes and ideation methods that are unusual or are new for them. The emphasis over the course of the year is not on making perfect objects, but in developing critical, creative thinkers who will move into the major studio areas prepared to explore the depths of their interests. This exhibition is the capstone of a very transformative year.

 Exhibition Opens

Wednesday, May 6

Summer Gallery Hours: M–Th 9:00 AM–4:00 PM

Exhibition Reception

Thursday, August 27 — 1:40–2:15 PM

Artwork pickup will begin at 2:20 PM


Gallery Hours

Weekdays 10AM-4:30PM

Closed during Fall/Spring Break, National Holidays and in accordance to campus closures.

In the event of inclement weather, the gallery will close based on campus protocol. Please contact the Inclement Weather/Class Status Line: 501-450-5000 for more information.

 

Contact Us:

Chief Curator: Nakeya Palmer Office: Windgate 123B
Office phone: 501-450-3659
Email:nethredge1@uca.edu

The newly named Carmen T. Thompson Gallery honors the legacy of Carmen Tiongson Thompson. Dedicated on September 20th, 2025

Past Exhibitions:

Annual Student Art Competitive 2026

Bubble Gum on Janson’s History of Art by Artist Tom Richard 

Alumni Artist in Resident Greyson Ruple

Forms of Structural Dysfunction 

Field Experiment Entanglements with the force of Gravity 

PLOTS: Shifting Narratives about African Art

Any Way Shape or Form – Keri Miki Lani Schroeder

Alumni Artist in Resident – Joshua Reynold’s Forged and Formed:

Experimental Dichotomy of Concrete and Metal Casting

The Riddick Collection

Annual Student Art Competitive 2025

Facade: A Casted Narrative

Korto Momolu A life of Art and Fashion

Harvesting Change/Cosechando Cambio

Peep (Hole) Show – Epilogue Exhibition

Russell Crotty: A Look into the Vast

Alumni Artist in Resident – Kaleigh Thomas’s Vision of Living Beings

Celebrating 25 Years of Arkansongs   

CentralARCollective Exhibition 

  Hip Hop Hooray: Celebrating 50 Years of Music and Culture

 Rex Deloney Returns to UCA 

Origin -> Expansion  Epilogue Exhibition – Foundations cohort 2 – 2022- 2023

‘Kristen Lewis: An Experimental Video and Vocal Experience’

Alumni Artist in Resident – Anna Wagner’s Disorder: A Hard Pill to Swallow