C. Tara Gladden
Artist - Curator - Educator
Curatorial STATEMENT
I approach my curatorial practice as a catalyst for community engagement & development, communication, learning, and shared experience. My vision and goal is to create and work within an art-centered environment that is a democratic, transformational space that nurtures inclusivity, constructive dialogue, and represents a multiplicity of perspectives.
My style is comprised of close collaborations with colleagues, artists, & the community to develop exhibitions and programming that foster curiosity, communication, and offer new experiences. By embracing and exploring various histories, issues, concepts, contemporary art, and social movements, the groundwork is set to form programs and environments that are animated by diverse, timely thought. My creative approach to curating and programming forms structures and models that work for the goals of each individual project or program.
I strive to create rigorous exhibitions and programs that ask questions about how art matters in the world, our communities, and in our everyday lives. I take an approach that steps out of the box as necessary; offering adventurous yet accessible programming that creates a context for both individual and shared community experience, and connects meaning with making for personal, memorable, transformative experiences.
CURATORIAL PROJECTS & LIVE PERFORMANCE PROGRAMMING
2012-current: John Cage Memorial Park and Chance House Artist Residency
*Co-founded, co-directed and co-curated with David Gladden.
Curatorial Selections for Cultural Affairs presenting program at Salisbury University:
2025
Wroten Piano Series presents Dynasty Battles
Global Experiences Series presents:
-Experience Salsa! Dance & Music lessons and a performance by all-female salsa group Las Guaracheras
-Miramar
-FURIA FLAMENCA
The Lab Series presents D. Spaulding and the Den Dogs
New Visions Series presents Symphony 21
Peter and Judy Jackson Chamber Series presents Duo Sorolla
All of the following curatorial projects were developed and exhibited at Kohl Gallery at Washington College
2024
The Weather Within and Without: Caryn Martin & Stephanie Wolff
2023
COLOR SURFACE SPACE & The Abstract Imagination
Sizhu Li: MOONMENT
Kameelah Janan Rasheed, SmooOOoOoooooOooth Operator: the eternal outlays ennoble and rekindle an unlikely savior
2022
Radiant Material: Contemporary Light Art by Roxana Azar, Tommy Bobo, Daniel Conrad, David Gladden, and Lindsay Packer
Stephanie Garon: PRY
2021
Encounters and Entanglements: The Art of Mapping Meaning
Monica Jahan Bose: RENEW
2020
On the Black History of Kent County and Washington College, by Jason Patterson
Virtual exhibit is featured on the Chesapeake Heartland website.
2020
Khristian Weeks: the Realest, online exhibit
2020
Intimate Generations: featuring contemporary artists working broadly around themes of family connection. Artists chanan delivuk, Roxana Alger Geffen, Aimee Gilmore, Khánh H. Lê, Kalen Na’il Roach, and Aaron Wax reimagine family narratives, illuminating and re-envisioning lives and identities.
2019
\\\SIGN SYSTEMS/// featuring Corinne Beardsley, Jordan Deal, Robin Kang, Linling Lu, Hedieh Ilchi, Victor Torres, Jonathan Sims, and Christy Deetz.
All of the following curatorial projects were developed and exhibited at Salisbury University Art Galleries
2019
DAVID FIRST: Dave’s Waves Sonic Café, interactive audiovisual exhibition and performance.
Link to exhibition and event images:
UNDERCURRENTS 01: Spring Festival celebrating underground Art and Culture on the Eastern Shore.
2018
Sabrina Ratté: SHIFTING LANDSCAPES, 3d animation exhibition of landscapes inspired by Tanguy and Kay Sage, and Brutalist architecture around Paris.
TIMOTHY NOHE: Voltage is Signal
HYPHENATIVE, group exhibition exploring mythic histories, re-imagined folk traditions and cultural appropriation.
*Co-curated with Elizabeth Kauffman
Link to Performance and Installation Images:
REMAKE/REMODEL, 2-person exhibition featuring artists Heather Harvey and Aurora Robson, both of whom create installations with trash and recycled materials.
*Co-curated with Elizabeth Kauffman
AMBER ROBLES-GORDON: The Talking Stick Project
CROSS CURRENTS, community-focused exhibition featuring contemporary artists on and around the Delmarva Peninsula. * Co-curated with Elizabeth Kauffman
BRAVE NEW EARTH, exhibition exploring climate change and the environment featuring work by Brack Morrow, Amy Balkin, and Heather Theresa Clark. * Co-curated with Elizabeth Kauffman
Link to Brack Morrow Residency Images:
THOMAS DEXTER, Multimedia Performance
2017
THE WAY WE WORKED, Smithsonian traveling exhibition about the history of Labor in the US. Included curated contemporary work by Mierle Laderman Ukeles, Cat Mazza and Curtis Woody. *Co-curated with Elizabeth Kauffman
RICHARD GARET: Within the Temporal, immersive electronic exhibition and performance.
Link to Performance and Installation Images:
Panoply Performance Laboratory: EMBARRASSED OF THE WHOLE, 3-week residency, interactive exhibition, 2 performances, and a performance workshop.
Link to Performance and Installation Images:
TANIA LOU SMITH: untitled (domestic gestures), performance video exhibition.
Liss LaFleur: IN TRAINING, interdisciplinary exhibition featuring work inspired by Claude Cahun.
Performance and Installation Images:
2016
inFORMATION: Perspectives in Black Culture featuring Black Radical Imagination screening, Baltimore Boom Bap Society, Ada Pinkston live performance with Ancestral Duo and Amorous Ebony. *Co-curated with Elizabeth Kauffman
SHATTERED FRAMES: The Films of Martha Colburn, featuring stump speech style election animations of “Drumpf” and “Hillary”, closed on election day.
LoVid: TEPHRA GARDEN, interactive media and textile exhibition.
BEING HER NOW: Feminine Identity in the 21st Century, juried exhibition, panel and curated live performance event. *Co-organized with Dr. Victoria Pass
Link to Performance and Installation Images:
Morgan Craig, RAZING THE NEW DEAL: AN EXPLORATION OF ARCHITECTURE AND IDENTITY
2015
THE BOOK OF EVERYDAY INSTRUCTION, Things I’ve seen people do lately by Chloe Bass, a participatory exhibition exploring one on one social interaction and voyeurism.
THE GREAT AMERICAN LANDSCAPE: Photographs of Ansel Adams, Eliot Porter, David H. Gibson and George Alexander Grant, in commemoration of the National Parks centennial, it included a book signing by Ren and Helen Davis.