Women of the Ozarks recently announced their second annual traveling exhibition, Unbound Spectrum. Featuring over 50 original works from six local artists, the exhibition tours four cities over eight months, offering bold and diverse perspectives in painting, sculpture, ceramics, and multidisciplinary art.

Founded in 2024 by artists Claire Pongonis and Tram Colwin, Women of the Ozarks’ mission is to spotlight local, female, and femme-identifying artists, bring Northwest Arkansas meaningful art in various media, and provide an opportunity for the community to engage with local artists and one another. Through mentorship, community support, and regional traveling exhibitions, Women of the Ozarks creates professional opportunities for emerging and established artists while fostering collaboration across the region. Recognizing a need to create opportunities that amplify women’s voices and uplift artists, the program focuses on the creation of new work, asking artists to create a collection based on a central theme. The cohorts are comprised of artists who are at the beginning of their creative practices (often creating in the margins of other jobs) and of established artists. 

“Women of the Ozarks really began with Tram and I wanting to create opportunities for ourselves to share new work and realizing that other artists in the area felt the same way. We wanted to create a space for those artists who don’t exhibit their work regularly to feel comfortable creating and sharing work alongside other artists,” said co-founder Claire Pongonis.

“Focusing on female artists and the art community the two missions of Women of the Ozarks. We feel the support of the Northwest Arkansas community and it’s our desire to allow our community not only to engage with our artists, but the art itself,” added co-founder Tram Colwin.

2025 Artist Cohort

Selected by a panel of jurors involved in the Northwest Arkansas arts community, this year’s six artists represent a spectrum of mediums and perspectives:

  • Autumn Blaylock: A historian, writer, and artist whose practice is rooted in storytelling, history, folklore, and its relationship to memory.
  • Emma Johnson: A painter and sculptor whose work explores perception, femininity, and identity.
  • Camilla Crittenden: An abstract painter and ceramicist whose work draws inspiration from nature and the Ozark Mountains.
  • Ceci Norman: An artist, arts administrator, and educator whose work focuses on storytelling and healing.
  • Emma Irwin: A painter originally from the Hudson Valley, whose abstract works and experimentation with color theory aim to simplify the complexities of adulthood into geometric forms.
  • Flora Saldivar: A painter specializing in large-scale works using a soak stain technique.

2025 Exhibition Schedule: Unbound Spectrum

The exhibition launched at Casa Magnolia in Springdale (February–April) and continued at Theo’s in Rogers (May–September).

Upcoming exhibitions include:

  • MIXD Gallery, Rogers — Pop-up featuring works from both the 2024 & 2025 cohorts (September 4th – 14th), Artist Talk September 12th
  • Local Color Gallery, Fayetteville — October 2025
  • Midnight Gallery, Bentonville — November–December 2025

Women of the Ozarks artists and co-founders invite the community to visit and engage with the exhibitions. Check their website and Instagram for opening receptions and special events at each location.

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