Monthaven Art and Cultural Center

Monthaven Arts and Cultural Center
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Monthaven Arts and Cultural Center
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Wendy Murray

Monthaven

Painting the Pike by Wendy Murray

The Long Way Home

Taking inspiration from pop artist Edward Joseph Ruscha’s Every Building on the Sunset Strip, artist Wendy Murray set out in early 2025 to document the buildings, vacant blocks and food trucks over a 6.5-mile section of Gallatin Pike in Nashville. The first drawing was completed on Feb. 25, 2025, and Murray is on track to have approximately 250 drawings in hand.

Both sides of Gallatin Pike were drawn plein air for this ambitious project. Her work captures the complexity and subtly of urban spaces changing under the pressures of gentrification. Recording the human experience and community response to the changes is part of her broader research.

The Long Way Home included approximately 170 drawings in the MACC’s Papillon Gallery. Taken together, these works reflect the atmosphere of a 6.5-mile section of Gallatin Pike. The exhibit will included a section that took a behind-the-scenes look at her process.

Murray is a Nashville-based contemporary visual artist known for her documentation of urban space through drawing, painting and poster making. She is currently an Artist-in-Residence at the Downtown Presbyterian Church in Nashville.

To listen to Murray’s interview on our podcast MACC Talk, click the button below.

Wendy Murray
MACC TALK

Robin Willis

HEALING ARTS COORDINATOR

Robin Willis is the MACC’s Healing Arts Coordinator. She also works as the Exhibition and Events Manager and Director of Outreach. Robin has a Bachelor of Arts in Architecture from Clemson University with a minor in Entrepreneurship. She is a multi-discipline artist with emphasis in writing, mixed media abstract painting, alternative process photography, collage, and book arts and binding. In addition to her art practices, she holds several healing modalities certificates, such as extensive kundalini yoga teacher training and education, Reiki master, systemic family constellation facilitator, and depth psychology-based therapy trainings. As an avid learner, she explores and encourages others in their exploration in art, psyche, and our relationship to the micro and macro worlds within and around us. Influenced by John Muir’s quote, When we try to pick out anything by itself, we find it hitched to everything else in the Universe, she fuses art, healing, and organization throughout her work and personal life as a creative-scientist minded person.

Kaylin Warden

Creative Design and Operations Manager

Kaylin Warden serves as the MACC’s Creative Design and Operations Manager. In this post, she oversees the organization’s graphic design work for exhibitions, events and special projects. She also coordinates the MACC’s arts outreach activities and assists with bookkeeping, among other duties. Kaylin, above all, is passionate about the arts. It comes as no surprise, then, that she is now pursuing a master’s degree in art history. When she’s not at the MACC, you can find her reading her favorite books (especially ones dealing with maritime mysteries), cooking, gardening, playing with her cat and two dogs, and cheering for the Nashville Predators.

Ruth Chase

Regional Arts Director
Ruth Chase is the Regional Arts Director of Monthaven Arts and Cultural Center, joining the team in 2023. For Ruth, the job is all about community, bringing people together to uplift and educate artists and art lovers alike. Her role at Monthaven is to strengthen the local artist community and build connections that will enrich Hendersonville and our surrounding communities through art exhibitions, art education, and opportunities for regional artists.
 
Prior to joining Monthaven, Ruth worked in the arts for over 30 years and is a multimedia artist and graduate of the San Francisco Art Institute. Her artistic practice is inquiry-based and engages in community bridge-building. She was awarded a Certificate of Appreciation from the City of Los Angeles, curated and juried exhibitions, and has taught at the Crocker Art Museum.
 
Ruth was awarded an Artist-in-Residence for Artist Activating Communities through a grant from the California Arts Council for three consecutive years. Her film Belonging screened at both the 18th Annual Nevada City Film Festival and Wild & Scenic Film Festival. She has received the Legendary Female Artist of Venice award, and she has exhibited in The Crocker Kingsley, the Museum of Northern California Art, and the Diego Rivera Gallery at the San Francisco Art Institute. Ruth also continues her work as a Curatorial Consultant and Art director for the Californian Indigenous Research Project, where she has worked with the local tribe since 2018. 
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