Vicky Lowe (Group Exhibition) | Aurora Hughes Villa & Janimarie Lester DeRose

Exhibitions open Sep 14 through Oct 23, 2026.

• Fri, Sep 18, 6–9 pm: Opening Reception & Salt Lake Gallery Stroll
• Fri, Oct 16, 6–9 pm: Salt Lake Gallery Stroll

Vicky Lowe (Group Exhibition)

This exhibit brings together a group of artists with connections to textiles as a living language of memory, resistance, and cultural continuity. Each thread ties personal histories to collective belonging, stories passed through generations, hands, and textiles. Rooted in ancestral knowledge and contemporary expression, the works honor weaving as an art, ceremony, healing, and storytelling. From fiber to form, these artists will invite us to listen closely: to feel the labor of preserving and protecting cultural practices, to see our visible and invisible connections, and, above all, to recognize our power to weave new futures with strength, memory, and dignity.

Biography — Vicky Lowe K’ulub

Originally from Chiapas, Mexico, Vicky Lowe K’ulub is a multidisciplinary artist and educator based in Salt Lake City. Her work varies from painting, hand-crafted paper collage, natural dyes, and backstrap weaving. Through her work she honors Indigenous knowledge and diasporic memory. As program director for Born from Corn and Weaving Memories at Artes de México en Utah, she develops culturally rooted workshops that empower community storytelling. Vicky began learning backstrap weaving from her mother, reclaiming a family tradition nearly lost in her generation. Her practice, shaped by self-taught practice and ancestral connection, is an act of resistance, healing, and belonging.

Aurora Hughes Villa & Janimarie Lester DeRose

This joint exhibition will feature both sculptural and functional ceramic work alongside mixed-media installation. Aurora Hughes Villa and Janimarie Lester DeRose share an interest in memories, domesticity, the body, and the decorative arts. Both artists plan to create new work for an exhibition at Finch Lane Gallery.

Aurora plans an installation combining ceramic objects and mixed media. She is exploring a new body of work that includes sewing and painting on hand-printed wallpaper, to be exhibited alongside slip-cast and press-molded ceramic forms. She intends to continue silk-screening text and imagery onto ceramic forms, creating objects that can be displayed on the wall and on pedestals.

Janimarie will continue exploring both functional and sculptural ceramic forms, depicting generations of mothers teaching daughters and suggesting a sense of belonging and purpose passed down through food and home. Layers of poetry, apron patterns, and windows tease the bittersweet edge to that security of place. Most of Janimarie's ceramic pieces will sit on pedestals and found objects such as antique ironing boards, chairs, and windows, while Aurora's work will present as an installation on one to two walls (and on pedestals).

Biography — Aurora Hughes Villa

Aurora Hughes Villa is an artist, educator, and art advocate. She is an Associate Professor and the Beverley Taylor Sorenson Endowed Program Director for Elementary Arts Education at Utah State University in Logan, Utah. Prior to moving to Utah, Aurora was a full-time art professor at North Central College (IL) where she taught sculpture and ceramics. Aurora holds degrees in art education and ceramics. After completing her MFA in Ceramics from the School of the Art Institute of Chicago (IL), she exhibited her work nationally, with her artwork appearing in Ceramics Art and Perception. Aurora’s ceramic work explores ideas and imagery relating to memory, home, domesticity, the body, and the decorative arts.

Biography — Janimarie Lester DeRose

Janimarie Lester DeRose is a Utah clay artist and educator who often works in her home studio, Salty Peach Pottery. Janimarie earned a BFA in Ceramics from Utah State University, explored Alaska for a few years, and returned home to be with family and pursue a degree in Art Education from Weber State University. This show presents new work produced in response to preparing a shared exhibition, though Janimarie has pursued the ideas behind this body of work for about 15 years, since the birth of her daughters. She engages functional pottery surfaces with layered images of recipes, aprons, windows, and women's figures, exploring generations of mothers and daughters and the bittersweet belonging passed down through food and home.