Curated by Stephanie J. Woods, this proposed exhibition will feature new work by interdisciplinary artist Johannes Barfield, which will combine illustrations, sound, and sculpture in response to the theme of Collective Futures. The exhibition will center on a speculative science-fiction narrative about a former archaeologist returning looted artifacts in a world shaped by a dying sun and portal technology. Through layered soundscapes, tactile materials, and speculative storytelling, the exhibition will explore themes of cultural restitution, ecological urgency, and radical imagination. This project proposes a future shaped collectively through acts of repair.
Stephanie J. Woods is a multi-disciplinary artist based in Albuquerque, New Mexico, where she also serves as an Assistant Professor of Interdisciplinary Art at the University of New Mexico. Originally from Seneca, South Carolina, and raised in Charlotte, North Carolina, Woods’ work is deeply rooted in her desire to preserve and celebrate her cultural heritage.
She earned her MFA in Studio Art from the University of North Carolina at Greensboro in 2015, and since then, has continued to build a dynamic career. In 2021, Woods was selected for the Black Rock Senegal artist residency in Dakar, Senegal, and that same year, she was honored with the 1858 Prize for Contemporary Southern Art by the Gibbes Museum of Art in Charleston, South Carolina.
Woods has also been awarded several other prestigious residencies and fellowships, including the Harpo Prize, the Bemis Center for Contemporary Arts Residency, the Fine Arts Work Center Fellowship, and the ACRE Residency. She has also spent time at the McColl Center for Art + Innovation, Ox-Bow School of Art and Artists Residency, and Penland School of Craft, among others.
Her work has been featured in major exhibitions, including at the Smithsonian National Portrait Gallery as part of Outwin 2025: American Portraiture Today, opening October 2025. Recent solo shows include the Sarasota Art Museum. Woods’ work is held in permanent collections at the Virginia Museum of Fine Arts, the Gibbes Museum of Art, and the Mint Museum, to name just a few. She has also been featured in BOMB Magazine, Art Papers, Lenscratch, Burnaway, and the Boston Art Review.
Johannes Barfield is an American visual and sound artist working across installation, video, photography, extended reality, collage, and music. His work explores themes of childhood memories, joy, extinction, the music played at family cookouts, restitution, and speculative futures.
Born in Winston-Salem, North Carolina, Barfield earned his Master of Fine Arts from Virginia Commonwealth University and is now based in Albuquerque, New Mexico. He serves as an assistant professor in the Honors College at the University of New Mexico, where he teaches art and humanities.
Barfield’s work has been featured at institutions including the Greenville Museum of Art in MARAUDERS, a show exploring future artifacts and new mythologies; Davidson College in The Sun Rises Spite of Everything, featuring artists such as Pope.L and Alexandra Bell; and the Nasher Museum of Art at Duke University in Reckoning and Resilience.
His accolades include the Mint Museum Atrium Health Award, the Toby Devan Lewis Fellowship, and residencies at the Carson Center for Emerging Media Arts, MASS MoCA, and the Fine Arts Work Center, among others. His work has been exhibited at the Nasher Museum, Mint Museum, PAAM Museum of Art, Van Every|Smith Galleries, 1708 Gallery, and more.