Grounds For Departure – Opening Reception

Grounds for Departure: A Historic House, An Art Museum

Masur Museum Main House 
August 20th, 2026 – October 31st, 2026 

Public Reception: August 20th, 2026, 5:30 — 7:00pm

Artist Talk at 6:30PM

Grounds for Departure will feature abstract painting and sculpture that engages directly with the architecture of the museum’s structure, mapping its domestic history within the walls of the current-day art museum.

About the Artists:

Katie Ford makes sculptures, textiles, and works on paper that explore the unstable qualities of the body and digital culture. She holds an MFA from the University of Georgia and a BFA from Washington University in St. Louis. Ford has been awarded residencies including the Icelandic Textile Center, the Women’s Studio Workshop, and 100 W Corsicana; and she has exhibited at institutions including the Samuel Dorsky Museum of Art (New Paltz), Wassaic Project (Wassaic), Neue Welte (Nashville), and Swan Coach House Gallery (Atlanta). She lives in Brooklyn, NY, where she is a Visiting Instructor at Pratt Institute.
www.katie-ford.com

Marlisa Dunn creates paintings that translate sensory memory and natural experience into layered, rhythmic landscapes. Drawing from the sounds, scents, and textures of her surroundings, she paints with collage-like construction—mixing hand-ground earth pigments and gestural oil stick marks to preserve fleeting impressions of place. Her work has been exhibited at the Wausau Museum of Contemporary Art (Wisconsin), the Richard M. Ross Art Museum (Ohio), the Springfield Museum of Art (Ohio), the O’Hanlon Center for the Arts (California), and the Cleveland Hopkins International Airport.
marlisadunn.com