cynthia mulcahy Curriculum Vitae

She/Her/Hers

Born: Irving, Texas

Works and Lives in Dallas, Texas // Jumanos, Kickapoo, Tawakoni, Caddo, Wichita and Commanche Lands

Selected Exhibitions/Public Art Projects

2025

Designing Motherhood, Houston Center for Contemporary Craft, traveling group exhibition, Houston, Texas

2024

The Château Show at the historic Aldredge House, group exhibition organized by Joel Murray and Clint Bargers, Dallas, Texas

Is It Real? Contemporary Artists Address Reproductive Freedom, group exhibition organized by Emily Edwards and Sara Hignite, Lagoon Studio, Dallas, Texas

Dallas Historical Parks Project, research-based public art project by lauren woods and Cynthia Mulcahy, Dallas, Texas (forthcoming)

Reclamation: Ari Briele, Zöe Buckman, Cynthia Mulcahy, Various Small Fires, Dallas, Texas

The Reading Room: Ten Years of Reading and Looking, Dallas Contemporary, Dallas, Texas

2023

Stream Trace: Dallas Branch Crossing, collaboration with artist Mary Miss for the exhibition Groundswell: Women of Land Art, organized by Dr. Leigh Arnold, Nasher Sculpture Center, Dallas, Texas

The Moral Stain of Segregation, quote and research by Cynthia Mulcahy and lauren woods included in the permanent museum exhibition about the life of Juanita J. Craft, Juanita J. Craft Civil Rights House & Museum, Dallas, Texas

The Endangered, collaboration with Verdigris Ensemble's choral production world premiere, Dallas Contemporary, Dallas, Texas

Who lit the fire?, group exhibition curated by Anita N. Bateman, Museum of Fine Arts Houston Associate Curator of Modern and Contemporary Art, Contemporary Art Center of New Orleans, New Orleans, Louisiana

Garden Party, group exhibition, SP/N Gallery, The University of Texas at Dallas, Richardson, Texas

Flowering, group exhibition, Oak Cliff Cultural Center, Dallas, Texas

2022

One More Once, group exhibition, Talley Dunn Gallery, Dallas, Texas

Unspoken, curated by Sarah E. Webb, Los Angeles-based Instruments of Memory, online exhibition

2019

A Field Guide to Wild Fauna of Dallas, Texas, research-based public art project in broadsheet form, Dallas, Texas

Flora and Fauna of Southern Dallas, large-scale exhibition curated for and from the Texas Archives/Rare Book Collection, 7th floor of the J. Erik Jonsson downtown branch of the Dallas Public Library, Dallas, Texas

2018

War Garden: United States of America, 1917-2017, solo exhibition, Talley Dunn Gallery, Dallas, Texas

2017

A Field Guide to Flora and Fauna of Southern Dallas, research-based public art project in fly-poster form, Dallas, Texas

2015

Performance as Gesture: Songs for a City Park, research-based public art project: publication and site-specific evening of musical

performances in the Japanese Garden of public city park Kidd Springs Park, Dallas, Texas

Kite Boy, video projection, collaboration with artist Robert Hamilton, Meyerson Symphony Center, Aurora festival, Meyerson section curated by Carson Chan, Dallas Arts District, Dallas, Texas

2014

Archive, exhibition devoted to the documentation of temporary public artwork Seventeen Hundred Seeds, a collaboration with artist Robert

Hamilton in 2012, Epitome Institute, San Antonio, Texas

2013

1700 Seeds Workshop, participatory workshop, collaboration with artist Robert Hamilton, Biblioteca Parque da Rocinha and Rocinha favela

community, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil

Montgomery to Selma: An Action, conceptual action, collaboration with artist Robert Hamilton, Voting Rights Trail, Alabama

Food, group exhibition curated by Iris Bechtol, Eastfield College, Mesquite, Texas

2012

Y'UTOPIAS - an almanac (of sorts) of sustainable and off-the-grid living in Texas (or thereabouts), The Reading Room, Dallas, Texas

Seventeen Hundred Seeds, collaboration with artist Robert Hamilton, temporary public artwork in a vacant city block, Dallas, Texas

2011

Square Dance: A Community Project, temporary public artwork, collaboration with curator Leila Grothe, Trinity River Audubon Center, Dallas,

Texas

Selected Recent Curatorial Projects

2013

Engines of War, co-curated with Charles Dee Mitchell, Klemens Gasser & Tanja Grunert, Inc., Chelsea, New York City, New York

2011

XXI: Conflicts in a New Century, co-curated with Charles Dee Mitchell, Oak Cliff Cultural Center, Dallas, Texas

Selected Awards and Grants

2022 American Institute of Architects Dallas Community Honor Award, Dallas, Texas

2020 Nasher Sculpture Center Artist Grant, Dallas, Texas

2019 Public Art Grant for A Field Guide to Wild Fauna of Dallas, Texas, City of Dallas Office of Arts and Culture

2017 Public Art Grant for A Field Guide to Flora and Fauna of Southern Dallas, City of Dallas Office of Cultural Affairs

2015 Public Art Grant for Performance as Gesture: Songs for a City Park, City of Dallas Office of Cultural Affairs

2011 Idea Fund Grant for Square Dance: A Community Project, Andy Warhol Foundation for the Visual Arts

Selected Presentations, Panels, and Juried Positions

2022 Juror, Nasher Artist Awards, Nasher Sculpture Center, Dallas, Texas

2021 Presenter, Sweet Pass Sculpture School, Dallas, Texas

2017 Presenter Dallas Area Society of Historians, "Topics in Dallas History: Public Dances, Segregated Parks, and a Single Japanese Garden,” Southern Methodist University, Dallas, Texas

2016 Presenter at New Cities Future Ruins, a curatorial initiative by Gavin Kroeber, winner of The Meadows Prize, SMU Meadows School for the Arts, Dallas, Texas

2014 Discussion Leader, Gallery Lab Dinner and Dialogue: Lauren Woods’ Dallas Drinking Fountain #1, Nasher Sculpture Center, Dallas, Texas

2013 Juror, Oak Cliff Film Festival, Dallas, Texas

2012 Juror, Oak Cliff Film Festival, Dallas, Texas

Presenter: recent public artworks Square Dance: A Community Project and Seventeen Hundred Seeds, curated by Anne Bothwell of

ArtandSeek.org, Dallas City Performance Hall, Dallas, Texas

2007 Juror, Moss Chumley Award, SMU Meadows Museum, Dallas, Texas

Education

1992 Rice University Publishing Program, Rice University, Houston, Texas

1991 B.A. History, Texas Tech University, Lubbock Texas, 1991 (magna cum laude)

Selected Professional Experience

2008 - present Dallas-based conceptual artist and independent curator

1995 - 2007 Director and Owner, Mulcahy Modern (contemporary visual arts gallery), Dallas, Texas, (left to concentrate on independent curatorial and artistic practice)

Selected Publications, Articles, Reviews

Fuentes, Jessica. "Craft and Care: A Review of 'Designing Motherhood." Glasstire.com, January 25, 2025. Photograph.

Keenan, Annabel. "We are down here fighting for our lives': Texas exhibition highlights crackdowns on reproductive healthcare and abortion access. Focusing on works by artists from the American South, "Is It Real?" raises awareness and funds for reproductive rights for communities on the front lines. The Art Newspaper, October 15, 2024. Photograph of Daddy (War Garden series).

Ahmad, Emma S., "Is It Real? Contemporary Artists Address Reproductive Freedom" in Dallas, Glasstire, October 14, 2024. Photo of Daddy (War Garden series)

Fuentes, Jessica. Top Five in Texas: October 10, 2024, Glasstire, October 10, 2024. Photo of Daddy (War Garden series).

Eve Hill-Agnus. Action-Oriented, In "Is It Real" artists and activists tackle issues of women's reproductive health, Patron Magazine, October/November Issue, 2024. Photo of Daddy (War Garden series).

Mulcahy, Cynthia. Domestic Hawks in the War Garden....Good and Evil Issue, May 2024, F Magazine.

Top Five: Glasstire counts down the top five art events in Texas, February 29, 2024. Photo of Abortion Tea Caddy III in the group exhibition Reclamation: Ari Brielle, Cynthia Mulcahy & Zöe Buckman at Various Small Fires, Dallas, Texas.

Thibodeaux, Julie. Oak Cliff Tree Grove Receives Historic Protection, DFW Green Source, November 17, 2023. Photographs.

Solomon, Deborah. Women of ‘Groundswell’: Thinking Outside the Spiral Revisiting the land artists at the Nasher Sculpture Center, a critic finds their work was never more relevant than it is today. Mention of and link to Cynthia Mulcahy's participatory walk in collaboration with Groundswell exhibition artist Mary Miss. New York Times, October 18, 2023.

MacWhillie, Lizzie. Dallas County Justice Initiative Works to Commemorate Sites of Triumph and Terror, Texas Architect Magazine, March/April 2023 Issue.

Smart, Lauren. Rooted in History. The Dallas Morning News Sunday Arts Section, July 3, 2022. Photograph of Abortion Seed Library.

Guerrero, Andrea A. American Monument: Remembering as a Form of Resistance. Chapter 20 of In and Out of View: Art and the Dynamics of Circulation, Suppression and Censorship. Edited by Catha Paquette, Karen Kleinfelder, and Christopher Miles. Afterward by Laura Raicovich and Svetlana Mintcheva. Bloomsbury Press published 2022.

Mulcahy, Cynthia. Moore Park opened in 1938 as largest Black park during segregation. Oak Cliff Advocate Magazine, Jan 21, 2021.

Eve Hill-Agnus. D Magazine Editor’s Look Back at Their Favorite Stories of 2020: Pandemic or not, this city had so many stories to tell this year. Here are a few of our best as chronicled by the magazine’s editors. D Magazine, December 28, 2020.

Stone, Rachel. Showbirds: Take a hike with this beautiful field guide to the Trinity River, Oak Cliff Advocate, June 26, 2020, photographs.

Shelf Life / An archive of non-perishable cultural sustenance from friends around the world: Cynthia Mulcahy, Nasher online initiative, April 2020, Nasher Sculpture Center, Dallas, Texas

A Field Guide to Dallas: Dallas artist Cynthia Mulcahy sketched the fauna she found in the Trinity Forest. Here’s what it all looks like, D Magazine, March 2020 Issue, photographs.

Holland, Cotter. Money, Ethics, Art: Can Museums Police themselves? The article includes a photo of Cynthia Mulcahy with others protesting and calling for the removal of Warren Kanders at the Whitney Museum of American Art on May 3, 2019. The New York Times, May 9, 2019, photographs.

Hallock, Jeremy. Cultivating a unique view of hostilities: Artist focuses a lens of flora and fauna to comment on the U. S. war machine, The Dallas Morning News, July 22, 2018, photographs.

Rees, Christina. A Stroll Through America’s War Garden with Cynthia Mulcahy, Glasstire, July 3, 2018, photographs.

Hill-Agnus, Eve. The Secret Garden: Thanks to the efforts of an Oak Cliff artist, a neglected Japanese garden may soon be revived in Kidd Springs Park, D Magazine, August 2017 Issue, photographs.

Simek, Peter. The Lost History of Dallas' Negro Parks: Two artists were commissioned to explore the city’s segregated past. What they found proved a bit too stark for the powers that be. D Magazine, June 2016 Issue, photographs. Simek, Peter. How Dallas Won the Right to Tell Its Own History. D Magazine, February 19, 2016.

Repko, Melissa. Dispute over markers for Dallas' 'Negro parks' leads foundation to pull out out of project. The Dallas Morning News, February 18th, 2016, photograph.

Repko, Melissa. Segregated parks gone, but the still divide: Historical Markers for Negro Parks spark dispute over ugly parts of Dallas' past. The Dallas Morning News, February 15, 2016, photographs.

Stephens, Alain. In Dallas, A Dispute Over How to Remember Segregated Parks: Historical markers are supposed to tell the history of public parks' Jim Crow past. But some say their version of history is whitewashed, NPR broadcast (Texas Standard), February 19, 2016.

Schutze, Jim. Fight Over Dallas' Racial Past Goes Wide of the Real Target. Dallas Observer, February 23, 2016, photographs.

Grothe, Leila. Texas in Practice: Contemporary Movements in Socially Engaged Art. MAP (Make Art with Purpose) book publication: The Workbook, September 2014, page 35, photograph.

Simek, Lucia. Dallas’ Historic African-American Parks to Receive Public Art Gift. Glasstire, May 2014, photograph.

Arnold, Leigh. DallasSITES: A Developing Art Scene, Postwar to Present, Dallas Museum of Art, digital publication accompanying the exhibition DallasSITES: Charting Contemporary Art, 1963 to Present at the Dallas Museum of Art, 2013.

Cotter, Holland. The photographs in Engines of War offer vantage points on battle, its precedents And its aftermath. The New York Times, April 25, 2013, photograph.

Saltz, Jerry. See Engines of War. New York Magazine, April 29, 2013 Issue.

Schjeldahl, Peter. Engines of War at Gasser Grunert. The New Yorker Magazine, April 28, 2013.

Espada, Desiree. In a Chelsea Photography Show, Two Dallas Curators Investigate the Fog of War. D Magazine, April 22, 2013, photographs.

Davenport, Bill. Mitchell and Mulcahy’s Second War Photography Project to Open in New York. Glasstire, March 17, 2013.

Simek, Pete. The Art Shows and Exhibitions You Can’t Miss in 2013. D Magazine, January 8, 2013, photograph.

Simek. Peter. This Year’s Visual Art: A Look Back at Trends and Names that shaped 2012. D Magazine, January 8, 2013.

Lewis, Betsy. Dallas’ Best Visual Art of 2012. Dallas Observer, December 18, 2012.

Meehan, Margaret. Seventeen Hundred Seeds: Cultivating art and community. Glasstire, June 2, 2012, photographs.

Ahlfinger, Erin. Seventeen Hundred Seeds: Farming as a Public Art Project. D Magazine Sidedish, May 22, 2012, photographs.

Simek, Peter. From hoedowns to putting the hoe down: farming as art. D Magazine, May 9, 2012, photograph.

Stone, Rachel. On West Davis at Van Buren, farming as art. Advocate Magazine, April 24, 2012, photograph.

Gubbins, Teresa. Community art project turns out to be a lot of fun. Pegasus News, November 14, 2011, photograph.

Simek, Peter. Two curators team-up for a project meant to bend art definitions for the betterment of community: How a community square dance becomes art. D Magazine, November 10, 2011, photograph.

Medina, Jennifer. Bow to Your Partner. Dallas Observer, November 10, 2011, photograph.

Wilonsky, Robert. Used to Be Everyone Square Danced 'Round These Parts. Now, It's An Art Project, Dallas Observer, October 20, 2011, photograph.

Simek, Lucia. XXI: Conflicts in a New Century: Images of a First Decade Fraught with Violence. Glasstire, May 26, 2011, photographs.

Bothwell, Anne. Examining The War Photography of Today. Art&Seek, May 19, 2011, photographs.

Simek, Peter. Late Photographer Tim Hetherington Honored With 'Restrepo' Screening Tonight. D Magazine, May 11, 2011, photograph.

Simek, Peter. The Rise of The Artist As Social Activist. D Magazine, May 4, 2011.

Mitchell, Charles Dee. Guest Blog: Capturing Today's Wars in Photos. Art&Seek, April 14, 2011, photographs.

Stone, Rachel. Grant money brings square dance to Audubon center. Oak Cliff Advocate Magazine, December 14, 2010.