31st Annual Undergraduate Student Juried Exhibition
Main Gallery, March 20– May 1, 2026
Opening Reception: First Friday, April 3, 2026, from 5:00 – 8:00 PM
Closing Reception: First Friday, May 1 2026, from 5:00 – 8:00 PM
Jurors select the most interesting, compelling, noteworthy, and highest quality artwork. from submissions made by currently enrolled undergraduate college students in Missouri and Kansas. The exhibition will occupy the Main Gallery KCAC; A variety of media will be represented, and viewers will be immersed in a panoply of diverse perspectives, approaches to art, colors, textures, and forms. The exhibition is an opportunity for students to be recognized as emerging artists in an established and professional art gallery, while introducing the collecting community to the artists who will be entering the arts scene over the next several years.
The 2026 Juror is Jessica Hong, Chief Curator at the Kemper Museum of Contemporary Art, KCMO. Former senior curator of modern and contemporary art at Toledo Museum of Art (Toledo, OH), Hong is a curator and cultural worker who has dedicated her practice to highlighting under-recognized narratives and stimulating generational change within institutional sites. Hong has worked with artists and communities at museums and organizations including Dartmouth’s Hood Museum of Art, the Institute of Contemporary Art/Boston, Harvard Art Museums, the Whitney Museum of American Art, and Independent Curators International (ICI).
Selected Artists:
Abbey Dickey + Audrie Castro + Avery Chambers + Blake Bolden + Cillian Sager + Clair Blair + Elizabeth Luna + Ellarie Haggart + Ellie Fowks + Esmerelda Hernandez + Ezra Aldernman + Finn Smith + Isabel Otero + Jasmine Pinera + Katie Mueller + Kylie Tilley + Lauren Miller + Lucas Nguyen + Lynn Svatek + Mady Van Ness + Manola Silva-Hanson + Marion Dae + Miles Meason + Natalie Bianchi + Nina Katz + Rene Churchill + Riley Leonard + Sophia Krumbein + Thanat Singhirunnusorn + Thomas Recker + Victoria Chadwell + Zo Ulibarri
The Leigh Rosenberg Earnest Memorial Fund awards a total of $2,250 in scholarships to exhibition participants , awarded by the juror and distributed in tiers of $1,000 $750 and $500.
This Year’s Winners are
First: Marion Dae, “Love Letter to a Loan Officer”
Second: Thanat Singhirunnisorn, “Fooood”
Third: Nina Katz, “Strings in Time”
Honorable Mention: Riley Leonard, “Body Architecture: Portraits of Myself and Marc”
