Voices From Springboard

Join us for a conversation with the artists in Springboard!

This discussion will be moderated by the show’s juror Julie Keyes (Keyes Gallery in Sag Harbor, New York).  Exhibiting artist panelists Karin Gielen, Tas Mahr, Saberah S. Malik, and Janice Smyth will consider timely and thought-provoking questions, including:

• What distinguishes a professional artist from an emerging artist—if anything at all?
• What excites you about the culture of the arts and among artists right now?
• What role does branding and marketing play in your career as an artist?
• AND MORE!

*thumbnail: Janice Smyth, Undertow, 2023. Modern quilt with recycled materials.

Julie Keyes is the founder and principal of Keyes Art, a premier global art consultancy in Sag Harbor, N.Y., with more than 30 years of expertise in the contemporary art world. Known for her discerning eye and deep knowledge of the art market, Keyes has guided private collectors, corporations, and cultural institutions in acquiring and presenting significant works of art. With a career spanning blue-chip galleries and emerging artist platforms, Keyes brings a unique perspective as both an advocate for rising talent and a trusted advisor to established collectors.

“Springboard invites artists to put their best foot forward. In conversation with the Museum’s permanent collection, the exhibition encourages artists to reflect on the past as they consider their own practice more critically and with greater ambition,” said Keyes.

Karin Gielen is a Belgian artist living and working in Rhode Island. Her work explores fragility, memory, and the quiet transformation of materials over time. In addition to painting, she creates installations that bring together sculpture, drawing, text, and video.

Her ongoing project This Is Not a Boat centers on delicate boat forms—stitched, mended, and sometimes dismantled—that reflect on belonging, repair, and the ways objects carry both personal and collective histories. Through subtle interventions and spatial arrangements, Gielen creates environments that invite slow looking and quiet reflection.

Gielen’s work is held in private collections in both Europe and the United States. She has been recognized with awards including the 2026 Creativity Award. More at https://www.karingielen.net/ 

Born in 1981, the son of artist Batuz, Tas Mahr grew up immersed in the arts, spending his early years in the ateliers of Leopoldo Presas and Aleš Veselý and influenced by members of the Société Imaginaire. He later attended international workshops at Atlzella with artists and professors from across Europe and Latin America and studied at Franklin College in Lugano, Switzerland.

Over the years he has collaborated with artists in Uruguay, worked as assistant, archivist, and curatorial collaborator with German artist Michael Morgner in Chemnitz, and curated exhibitions and projects throughout Europe and the Americas. His work includes the installation of Helmets for Peace—a public art project transforming military helmets into symbols of reflection and reconciliation—presented in Chemnitz and at the German Military History Museum in Dresden. He has also directed international projects and curated exhibitions in Berlin, Mexico, and the United States.

Exhibiting widely, nationally and internationally Saberah Malik’s work addresses fractured lineages, heritage and socio-environmental injustices. Engineering flat fabric into luminous, ethereal, architectural or biomorphic forms, she has taught her proprietary method of molding cloth and surface work at  Slater Mill Historic Site, Penland School of Craft, NC; Haywood Community College of Art, NC; Stonehill College, MA; Wheaton College, MA; Panjab University, Lahore, Pakistan. A 2025 residency artist at MASSMoCA Studios, her recent awards include Rhode Island State Council on the Arts three-year General Operating Support for Artists grant, McColl Johnson Fellowship, Wassaic Project Residency. Her work is included in permanent collections at Fidelity Investments Collection, MA; Danforth Art Museum, MA; Akdeniz University, Turkey, and in private spaces internationally. Saberah’s work has often been featured in textile publications and journal articles. She is profiled in NetWorks 2014 and Film 1 of RI Art Archives.

Janice Smyth lives in Newport, Rhode Island and is a late bloomer. Now a retired Harvard-trained physician, she is a modern quilt artist exploring the interpretation of contemporary icons: e.g. the barcode, computer code like the binary code, genetic code, and iconography like the on-off symbols. In later textile projects, her designs were entirely improvised and based on design, color, and form. They are a synthesis of complexity and contradiction, and many observers see themes of urbanity.
Her quilts were exhibited multiple times in Newport Art Museum Biennial Shows, the German Gilde Triennial, Quilts=Arts=Quilts/NY, the Festival of Quilts/England, the European Open Championships/Netherlands, five or six times in American Quilt Society shows, QuiltCon, and in multiple local galleries in Sarasota, FL and Kingston, RI. She was twice a semi-finalist in the Tokyo Great Quilt Festival. Janice retired from quilt making after completing Brave New World. “That’s it!”, she said, “I’m done! I’ll never do anything this good ever again!”, and got rid of all the notions and fabric. She is down to 2 sewing machines and has since pivoted to painting cinnamon buns and hamburgers.