The Goldmark Cultural Center’s John H. Milde Gallery presents Drawing Invitational 6, an exhibition featuring works by Andrew DeCaen, Kate Colin Wood, Marianna Seaton, Magaly Cantù, Paul Armstrong and Betsy Belcher.
The exhibition is on display in the Goldmark Cultural Center’s John H. Milde Gallery from 13 October, 2025 to 7 November, 2025.
An opening reception for the exhibition will be held on Saturday, 25 October, from 2 to 4 pm. An artist talk featuring the exhibiting artists will be held in the gallery during the reception.
About the Exhibition
Drawing is a universal human practice. We draw before we know we are drawing. Dragging a stick through sand on a beach, stitching a design on the edge of fabric, building a pattern of marks while talking on the phone, these and more everyday actions can be seen as drawing, as a natural part of our expressive lives.
To my imagination, drawing as an artist’s practice has always held a strong relationship to writing: the author or artist seeks to describe (or explain) an idea (or object) the individual holds in her mind. This where my taste for drawing began.
An artist often begins this journey with a pencil or pen, exploring the dimensions of the idea, thinking an idea into being. It is what others have called the “thinking hand” that seems to “write time” into being. The corollary might be to “draw space” into being, perhaps.
In assembling the diverse group of artists who make up this 6th Annual Drawing Invitational, I tried to reach out to some artists who are more conventional in method and others who expand the definition of drawing with their work. These artists all celebrate the idea of drawing in different ways, and I relish the discovery of new artists who expand my world with their uniqueness.
I’d like to thank the Goldmark Cultural Center for their commitment to this exhibition, as well as the artists: Andrew DeCaen, Kate Colin Wood, Marianna Seaton, Magaly Cantù, Paul Armstrong and Betsy Belcher.
About the Artists
Marianna Seaton is a multi-disciplinary artist currently working in drawing, collage, and assemblage. She explores common objects, such as the cardboard box, old maps, and toys as a way of looking at historical events to inform her present work. Artworks embrace and change the mood of often overlooked objects and structures that have been embedded in contemporary culture.
Marianna earned an MFA in drawing and painting from The University of North Texas in 2021. She was the recipient of an artist’s microgrant from a private donor in 2020, and in 2023 from the City of Lewisville. She has shown work in regional galleries and universities, including Ro2 Art, The MAC, Arts Fort Worth, The Lewisville Grand, and Cedar Valley College.
Andrew DeCaen’s artworks use drawing, printmaking, and sculpture to examine the space and time of our meals. DeCaen received a BA from the University of Dallas and an MFA from the University of South Dakota. His artworks have been shown broadly in the US and internationally in Argentina, Brazil, Bulgaria, Canada, China, Colombia, Denmark, England, Finland, Italy, Japan, Korea, Romania, Sweden, and Turkey. DeCaen’s artworks have been featured in publications such as Drawing magazine, Printmaking Today, and 500 Paper Objects. DeCaen lives and works in Denton, Texas, where he is an Associate Professor of Art at the University of North Texas.
Magaly Cantú is an interdisciplinary artist based in the DFW metroplex. She works between traditional printmaking, painting, and expanded ceramic practices. Through the translation of familial relationships, personal memories, photographs, and daydreams. Magaly dissects experiences of girlhood as a Latina and the impacts of navigating in-between tradition and modernization. Magaly has shown work at Arts Fort Worth, 500X Gallery, the University of West Virginia, and the K Space Contemporary. Her work has also been added to multiple collections including the Marais Press print collection at The Hilliard Art Museum and Incisori Contemporanei, Villa Benzi Zecchini, in Caerano di San Marco, Italy. She currently teaches at the University of North Texas and the University of Dallas.
Paul Armstrong is a 2D artist based in Denton, TX, currently in the final year of his MFA program at UNT. His prints, drawings, and paintings use the aesthetic and conceptual framework of the curiosity cabinet to explore the ways we create, perceive, and extrapolate meaning from images.
Kate Colin Wood’s studio practice consists of 2D work that interprets expansive hypothetical spaces, inspired by mathematical theories, physical infrastructure, and nature. Within her work, she combines oppositional elementals. A single work may reference painterly abstraction, geometric hard-edge abstraction, still life drawing, 3D rendering, Photoshop gradients, or highways. Her paintings are rooted in process, both unpredictable and systematic, and the different techniques side by side create ambiguous space. Within current work, built up oil paint exists alongside areas of raw stained canvas or graphite drawing. This method allows the viewer to see the various stages of the drawing and painting while creating dynamic interplay of figure and ground.
Kate Colin Wood earned her MFA from University of Dallas and obtained her BFA from University of North Texas. She is currently teaching full-time at St. Mark’s School of Texas. From 2014-2016, she was a 500X Gallery member. Kate Colin Wood was a 2012 recipient of the Kimbrough Fund awarded by the Dallas Museum of Art.
Betsy Belcher was born in Texas and has exhibited her artwork for many years, taught painting and drawing, held the position of Art Gallery Manager at both the University of Dallas and at Cedar Valley College, curating many exhibitions.
Ms Belcher received her B.F.A. in Printmaking from Indiana University, Bloomington, graduating with honors, and elected to the Phi Beta Kappa honor society. She later received her M.A. in Painting, and minor in Art History, from the University of New Mexico, Albuquerque, and her M.F.A. in Painting from the School of the Art Institute of Chicago. Her work is held in numerous public and private collections.
“I like to think of my paintings and drawings as artifacts of my active perceptual process: my experience of form and space, animated by color and gesture, and inflected by emotion and thought. I want to communicate through the materiality of whatever medium I use. I try to think physically with the paint, charcoal or pastel, without language.”