Transcending the Beauty Paradigm
August 26 – October 18, 2026
Ewing Gallery of Art + Architecture
1715 Volunteer Boulevard
September 4 – October 17, 2026
UT Downtown Gallery
106 S. Gay Street
Art, Movement, and Disability: Transcending the Beauty Paradigm is a 2026 book authored by University of Tennessee Associate Professor Emeritus of Art History, Dr. Timothy Hiles. The exhibition brings Hiles’ book into the gallery space, showcasing a selection of the artists featured in his research. These artists’ practices challenge conventional narratives of disability, embodiment, and representation. The works in Art, Movement, and Disability address concepts of disability reclamation, invisible disability, movement, and conversation—where the work engages the viewer in a dialogue.
Exhibiting artists | Sue Austin, Matt Bodett, Laura Ferguson, Elizabeth Jameson, David Johnson, Rebecca Kamen, Christine Sun Kim, KYRIANNA, Riva Lehrer, Alessandro Schiattarella, and Alice Sheppard / Kinetic Light.
These exhibitions and related programming are supported in part by a grant from the Helen Frankenthaler Foundation and Tennessee Arts Commission’s Arts for All program. Co-sponsorship is provided by UT’s Denbo Center for Humanities and the Arts, the School of Art Programming Committee, and through a College of Arts and Sciences Haines-Morris Grant. Additional funding is provided by The Creative Motif Fund.
FIRST FRIDAYS
SEPTEMBER 4 + OCTOBER 2 | 5-9PM
UT Downtown Gallery | 106 S. Gay Street
As part of Downtown Knoxville’s First Friday Art Walk, the UT Downtown Gallery is open until 9pm on the first Friday of each month. We hope you’ll join us for one or all of our First Friday events. UT Downtown Gallery events are free and open to the public.
AUTHOR’S TALK | DR. TIMOTHY HILES
SEPTEMBER 10 | 5:30-7PM
McCarty Auditorium, A+A 109 | 1715 Volunteer Blvd.
Join us for a talk by University of Tennessee Associate Professor Emeritus, Dr. Timothy Hiles. Hiles’ research and book, Art Movement, and Disability: Transcending the Beauty Paradigm is catalyst and source for the exhibitions.
ASL interpretation will be available for this event.
ARTIST TALK | MATT BODETT
SEPTEMBER 22 | 5:30-7PM
McCarty Auditorium, A+A 109 | 1715 Volunteer Blvd.
Matt Bodett received his MFA from Boise State University in 2011, and taught printmaking there until he moved to Chicago in 2013. Since moving to Chicago he has played an active role in disability advocacy and utilizing artwork to open dialogue around madness.
Matt’s work directly responds to his lived expereinces with madness. Being given a dianosis of schizo-affective disorder in 2005, he has spent his career attmpeting to understand his own mind, the social implications of madness, and the historical underpinnings. His artwork continues to evolve and pulls references from Western Art history in an attempt to connect the ideals of western society to the problematic nature of how we interact with contemporary madness.
ASL interpretation will be available for this event.
ARTIST WORKSHOP | MATT BODETT
SEPTEMBER 24 | 5-7:30PM
UT Downtown Gallery | 106 S. Gay St.
Join us for a workshop led by artist Matt Bodett. This workshop is capped at 12 participants. The workshop is free and all supplies will be provided.
Please register at the link below
Matt Bodett | School (Fool Series), 2025
ASL interpretation will be available for this event.
DEAF NIGHT AT THE EWING GALLERY WITH LEE HANDLER
SEPTEMBER 30 | 5:30-7:30PM
Ewing Gallery | 1715 Volunteer Blvd.
The Ewing Gallery welcomes Knoxville’s Deaf Community to an evening of art in Art, Movement, and Disability at our on-campus location. This event will be led by Lee Handler, UT Alum, who works with cultural institutions to improve accessibility to exhibitions and spaces for Knoxville’s deaf community. Lee’s introduction will be followed by an evening in the Ewing Gallery with gallery talks and ASL interpretation.
ARTIST TALK | RIVA LEHRER
OCTOBER 7 | 5:30-7PM
McCarty Auditorium, A+A 109 | 1715 Volunteer Blvd.
Riva Lehrer is an artist, writer and curator who focuses on the socially challenged body. She is best known for representations of people whose physical embodiment, sexuality, or gender identity have long been stigmatized.
Lehrer’s work has been seen in venues including the National Portrait Gallery of the Smithsonian, Yale University, the United Nations, the National Museum of Women in the Arts in Washington, DC, the Arnot Museum, the DeCordova Museum, the Frye Museum, the Chicago Cultural Center, and the State of Illinois Museum.
Lehrer is on faculty at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago, and instructor in the Medical Humanities Departments of Northwestern University.
Her memoir, Golem Girl, was published in 2020.
ASL interpretation will be available for this event.
ARTIST TALK | REBECCA KAMEN
OCTOBER 13 | 5:30-7PM
McCarty Auditorium, A+A 109 | 1715 Volunteer Blvd.
Rebecca Kamen, sculptor and lecturer on the intersections of art and science, seeks ‘the truth’ through observation. Her artwork is informed by wide-ranging research into cosmology, history, philosophy, and by connecting common threads that flow across various scientific fields to capture and re-imagine what the scientists see.
Kamen is a professor emeritus of art at Northern Virginia Community College and continues to investigate how the arts and creativity can enhance innovation and our understanding of science. An outcome of Kamen’s research has included the development of an art component for George Mason University’s Aspiring Scientist Summer Internship Program (ASSIP), encouraging science interns to use the arts as an innovative way of interpreting their research.
Currently, Kamen is serving as artist in residence in The Computational Neuroscience Initiative and the Department of Physics and Astronomy at the University of Pennsylvania.
ASL interpretation will be available for this event.
