OCTOBER 3 - NOVEMBER 22, 2026
Exhibition Statement
Art Lives Here brings together works by artists we have chosen to live with, many of them friends who are rooted in Durham and in our home state of North Carolina. Drawn largely from our personal collection, the exhibition offers an introduction to Boardinghouse Arts through the art and relationships that have shaped us.
Our collection has grown over time through friendship, curiosity, admiration, and a desire to support artists whose work matters to us. Art Lives Here considers collecting not as an exclusive practice reserved for experts or people with significant means, but as a form of participation and stewardship: a way to support an artist, and an opportunity to care for their work and allow it to become part of the texture of our lives.
As Boardinghouse opens its doors, we want the gallery to feel a little like entering our home. The works gathered here tell stories about the artists and communities we care about and offer a glimpse of what is to come.
Special thanks to our friends who shared their personal stories and are trusting us to steward work from their collections for the duration of this show.
Love,
Laura & Shirlette
PS – The exhibition has grown! Fittingly, Art Lives Here now also includes many works borrowed from the collections of the artists in our collection. It weaves a web of relationships that spans 13 local collections through 35 artworks by 27 artists.
Artwork Information
1
William Paul Thomas
Linda's Guy
Oil on canvas, 2019
From the Collection of Linda Belans
There, in a hallway at Duke University’s Rubenstein Art Center, I happened upon a series of portraits painted by William Paul Thomas. It was at that moment, in 2017, I knew he was the artist who could capture the depth and complexity of MyGuy Jim Lee. Just look at his eyes. Commissioned June, 2019. - Linda
2
Beverly McIver
Remembering Mama's Birthday
2015
From the Collection of Warren Hicks and Martha Wilkes
3
Lamar Whidbee
Sacrifice
2015
From the Collection of Laura Ritchie & Shirlette Ammons
I met Lamar with William Paul Thomas sometime around 2014. He was a recent graduate of NCCU (a student of Beverly McIver’s) and would soon enter UNC’s MFA program. Lamar had a solo exhibit at The Carrack in 2015, Diary of a Wretched Man, and it has been an honor to continue stewarding this painting ever since.
- Laura
4
John Felix Arnold
Portrait of William Paul Thomas
Spray paint, gesso, and graphite on paper, 2021
From the Collection of William Paul Thomas
I had fun placing William Paul Thomas’s floating head in the center of this wall! He created four out of the seven pieces hanging here, including the headless image of his own body to the right. Will is a connector, and I’m glad to have met Felix through this piece's inclusion in the show. - Laura
5
William Paul Thomas
A Gift From the Protector
Chromaluxe Metal Print, 2021
From the Collection of Laura Ritchie & Shirlette Ammons
This was purchased from Portrait Mode, Pop Box Gallery’s first show. I remember Will reflecting on his new role as a parent through this work, and now it hangs upstairs in our house near our daughter’s bed. - Laura
6
William Paul Thomas
Shorlette and Shirlette
Oil on canvas, 2024
From the Collection of Shorlette & Shirlette Ammons
Laura commissioned these portraits as a gift to Shirlette & Shorlette in honor of their 50th birthdays.
7
Elsa Hoffman
Custom work commissioned for Laura & Shirlette's wedding
Plasma cut steel, 2020
From the Collection of Laura Ritchie & Shirlette Ammons
We got married underneath this sculpture, twice! - Laura
8
Elsa Hoffman
trinity bench
Steel, pigmented concrete, crushed brick (703 W Trinity Ave), 2023
From the Collection of Elsa Hoffman
Elsa collected the bricks she used here from this site before the renovation.
9
Katy Mixon
251k Female Acres Rerouted
Carved oil on panel, 2015
From the Collection of Laura Ritchie
This was part of Katy’s MFA thesis show at UNC in 2015. It was made by applying many layers of oil paint to panel and then carving away at the surface to create this texture. Katy saves the paint chips to make new pieces. Ritual and repetition - I could look at it for hours. - Laura
10
MJ Sharp
Dark Dill
8 x 10 film, 2020
From the Collection of Laura Ritchie
MJ taught my first and only photography class at UNC. In hindsight, I cannot believe that I had the privilege to learn from her in a “101” level class! She is one of several former teachers in the area who stayed in touch with me over the years, checking in, offering encouragement, and generously sharing resources and connections as I’ve grown into an adult and arts worker in Durham.
This was a recent purchase, from her 2025 show at Craven Allen Gallery called Nightscapes. Like many of her photographs, it was created through a long film exposure in almost total darkness. I love the way that her technique transforms a still life or landscape. She captures existing objects in real space and time, but in a way that our eyes will never experience. - Laura
11
Kate Medley
Meat Market (Clayton, GA)
2017
From the Collection of Jennings Brody
Kate’s work brings me so much joy. Especially as a shopkeeper. She catches so perfectly the art of a display. The assembly of colors and faces and taxidermy. It’s magic to me! - Jennings
12
Phil Freelon
Networking
Digital image on archival pigment print, 2013
From the Collection of Mavis Gragg
A friend told me that Phil Freelon had a show at Craven Allen Gallery in Durham. I wasn’t living in Durham at the time but thought it would be cool to collect work by such a renowned architect and a Durham artist. I picked this particular piece because I love networking - connecting people is a fuel for me. I also loved that it came with a certificate of authenticity. - Mavis
13
Keisha Scarville
Untitled from "Passports" series (Black Dots)
Acrylic paint on archival inkjet print, 2014
Untitled from "Passports" series (Black Stars)
Acrylic paint and metallic paper on archival digital print, 2018
Untitled from "Passports" series (Black Stars)
Acrylic paint and metallic paper on archival digital print, 2018
From the Collection of Gail Belvett
I resonate deeply with Keisha Scarville’s passport series on many levels: accessibility, nostalgia, our shared 1st gen immigrant experience. I am a huge fan. - Gail
14
Kennedi Carter
When hands touch
2018
From the Collection of Mavis Gragg
Kennedi and I met when she was 19, and it was right before she exhibited her work, including this piece, at Vogue Italia. We were connected by The Nasher, and I asked her if she sold her work. She hadn’t sold much at that time, but she agreed to let me purchase three pieces from her. This was the first one. We set the price and I made payments over time because I wanted both of us to experience building that kind of trust with each other. It felt special to be part of her early days as a professional artist. It is also a gorgeous image - very tender and loving. - Mavis
15
Saba Taj
nazar series, grief/body I and II
Prints, 2017
From the Collection of Laura Ritchie & Shirlette Ammons
I met Saba in 2012 (2011?) when she walked into The Carrack and handed me a CD with her portfolio. Over the last 15 years, we have collaborated on many art events, spaces, and exhibitions. These prints came into our home during the pandemic and were framed by Through This Lens. I love the way the figures and adornments echo and inform the large painting that we more recently purchased, Wedding. - Laura
saba will exhibit a new series of paintings, ephemera, at Boardinghouse Arts in January 2027.
16
Hiva Kadivar
Cutting Through the Familiar no. 1, no. 2, and no. 3, 2024
Mixed media
From the Collections of [name], Catherine Edgerton, and Saba Taj
Hiva Kadivar’s work invites a deep intimacy through a wide, bird's-eye lens. She somehow elicits the personal and universal in the same brushstroke. She’s one of the most remarkable artists in North Carolina, and I feel honored to steward her incredible work! - Catherine
Cutting Through the Familiar was displayed in the Death Planted a Garden exhibit at Queen Street Magic Boat in 2024, co-curated by The Art Chose Me (Gail Belvett), Pop Box Gallery (Mavis Gragg & Laura Ritchie) and QSMB (Catherine Edgerton). The pieces live separately in 3 different collections but have been reunited for Art Lives Here.
17
Catherine Edgerton
Rat
Oils, watercolor, graphite on paper mounted on wood, 2022
From the Collection of Laura Ritchie
Rat is from a series called Colonies that explores the tension between the construct and reality of whiteness by combining graphite archetypes, bleaching coral, and self-portraits. Catherine exhibited five of these large works alongside her books and prints at perfect lovers in 2022 in a show curated by Pop Box Gallery. I love the dimensionality of the giant collage, the quality of the painting, and the complex story that she tells by merging these three bodies. - Laura
18
Renzo Ortega
Esperanza, 2017
Acrylic on canvas
From the Collection of Carrie Alter and Matt McMichaels
Matt and I fell in love with Renzo Ortega’s paintings at the Carrboro Arts Center in 2018. Esperanza, in particular, spoke to us but we couldn’t afford it. We didn’t know Renzo at the time, but I started reaching out to him via social media. A few years later, after a lot of negotiating, we finally bought it at a price we could afford, but we didn’t feel great about the price. It felt like a steal, and he had just had his twins. Since the price didn’t sit quite right with us. Matt and I made a promise to each other to buy another Renzo Ortega painting as soon as we could afford to pay full price. - Carrie
19
Carrie Alter
Alyson's World
Oil on canvas, 2010
From the Collection of Laura Ritchie
Carrie and I met during my first gallery gig, at The ArtsCenter in Carrboro. I was still an undergraduate student then - or just out of college? - with very little experience in curation or art installation. She treated me with so much professional respect, and our collaboration on her exhibit, They Bite Because They Are Alive, made a deep impression that encouraged me to continue on the path that has become my career.
I fell in love with Alyson’s World then, but I did not think of myself as a collector yet. The painting found its way to me a few years later, with this note from Carrie:
“This painting has officially been yours since 2016. It was last shown in NYC, in 2015. Before I shipped it, I wrote a note on the stretcher bars. It was our time together, while installing my show in that Carrboro gallery that will always delight my introverted self. It is indeed those impactful memories that feed us as we grow and change and really get to know ourselves. It was also poignant memories of my own childhood that pushed me to create this painting. Happy birthday, Laura and congratulations on your new home. May you fill the rooms with meaning, memories, and love.”
20
Renzo Ortega
Older Son, 2024
Acrylic on Canvas
From the Collection of Carrie Alter and Matt McMichaels
(continued from the label for Esperanza)
I turned 50 in 2024, and tend to use “birthday money” to purchase art. In fact “money to purchase art” has become a tradition. Since it was my 50th my family came together and collected more than usual. We bought Older Son from Craven Allen which exhibits Renzo’s more manicured or traditional style. The title helped us settle on that one from the others we loved at the exhibit. It also felt great to support an art venue we adore. We love our growing art collection but Esperanza will always have a special place in our hearts. It was the first time Matt and I were able to buy something we both truly fell in love with. - Carrie
21
Clarence Mayo
Red Moon
Acrylic and joint compound, 2025
From the Collection of Jim Lee
Clarence Mayo is one of my favorite artists. This is one of his more abstract works. I was moved by his use of color and form to get at a kind of nonspecific tribal or ritualistic feel. - Jim
22
Jim Lee
Lanterns Revealed
Archival pigment ink print on fine art paper
From the Collection of Laura Ritchie
I bought this from a show at the Durham Art Guild. I love Jim’s eye. Whether he photographs parts of a Chinese lantern plant, builds sculptures, or makes a sharp political statement, he does so with incredible skill, ingenuity, and often a dash of humor. His meticulously constructed works always shift the way I see, and invite me into new physical and conceptual worlds. Jim has been a mentor and friend since my earliest days at The Carrack, and Boardinghouse Arts would not exist without him. - Laura
23
Kesha Bruce
Duunas
Acrylic on canvas, 2014
From the Collection of Mavis Gragg
I was invited to collect this artist by a gallery I’d already built a relationship with, and I was immediately drawn to the colors in this work. Ultimately, I was able to buy it because I had just totaled my car in an accident that was someone else’s fault. I wanted to replace the bad energy from the wreck with good energy, so I decided to use the proceeds from my accident to buy art instead of a new vehicle. This is from Kesha’s Guardian series. - Mavis
24
Ann Marie Kennedy
Toad Lily
Abaca Paper with plants and string, 2013
From the Collection of Laura Ritchie
I purchased this from the first (and last!) live auction fundraiser for The Carrack in 2013. You can see from the thumbnail image that it was originally much more vibrant, but it faded after years in my living room without museum glass. I finally had it framed properly by Through This Lens a few years ago to protect it from further fading. I loved its original ghostly quality and still love it now.
I was introduced to Ann Marie by Susan Harbage Page when I was an undergraduate student at UNC, circa 2009. Susan’s assignment was to meet a living woman artist, so I drove to Bonded Llama in Raleigh, Ann’s studio at the time, and interviewed her. Her work had a strong influence on my studio practice at the time. It was also the first time I ever saw a professional artist working outside of an academic setting. - Laura
25
Susan Harbage Page
Nun with Apple
Gelatin Silver Print, 2002
From the Collection of Laura Ritchie
This was a gift to me from Susan, my former professor and now dear friend. A few years after I graduated, I worked with one of her classes to curate a group show at The Carrack. It was a very challenging and rewarding process. She presented this to me at the end, in front of her students, because she wanted to demonstrate to them how a culture of generosity and reciprocity can also flow through the art world. The image also exemplifies this sentiment to me. It is my most cherished work and has hung over the mantle of every home I’ve lived in since I received it. - Laura
26
Susan Harbage Page
Pink Madonna
Found plaster and horsehair sculpture, pink spray paint, 2008
From the Collection of Walker Page
A found statue of the Madonna traditionally used as a symbol to enforce rigid standards for females such as purity, motherhood, obedience, and virginity is transformed and subverted with the use of bright glossy pink into a more playful, sexual, liberated and less restrictive image. - Susan
27
Mikalene Thomas
Portrait of Maya #10, 95/732
UV pigment print on 410gsm Somerset Tub Sized Radiant White paper with 4 metallic silkscreen glitter and shimmer layers, a CMYK silkscreen central panel and matte varnish seal, 2024
From the Collection of Laura Ritchie & Shirlette Ammons
This is a recent acquisition via the platform Avant Arte, which makes work by world-renowned artists accessible to the general public. It was purchased as a gift by Laura for Shirlette and will ultimately hang in the recording studio as inspiration for the vibe downstairs at Boardinghouse.
28
Meg Stein
throughout my arms, shaking off rainwater, an animal, elegant
Ceramics, 2025
From the Collection of Laura Ritchie
I purchased this from my dear friend Meg’s recent solo show, BEWILDERNESS. Meg invited me to curate that exhibition collaboratively with her, so I had the opportunity to engage deeply with this body of work. This piece is part of a series called Felt Sense, and was surrounded by 6 other similarly sized but differently shaped and colored ceramic works in the original show. I chose this one because of the color (pink!) and intricate coral and flower-like textures, and for the feeling it embodies. I love seeing it on the wall in this grouping. - Laura
Meg Stein and Antoine Williams have a two-person show coming up at Boardinghouse in the spring.
29
Antoine Williams
Future Past Series #4
Mixed media on paper, 2021
From the Collection of Gail Belvett
I met Antoine Williams when he was an MFA student at UNC with William Paul Thomas. They did a two-person show at The Carrack in 2014 called Nah Mean?! that aimed “to bridge the gap between P.C. conversations and oversimplifications of race- and class-based conflict” through paintings and multimedia installation. Antoine did large works with wheatpaste directly on the wall for that exhibit. I love seeing how a similar approach translates so well to this smaller format.
- Laura
Meg Stein and Antoine Williams have a two-person show coming up at Boardinghouse in the spring.
30
Kennedi Carter
Untitled (Boley)
2024
From the Collection of Laura Ritchie & Shirlette Ammons
31
Clarence Heyward
Nothing New Under the Sun
Hand cut paper collage/ Gold leaf, 2021
From the Collection of Gail Belvett
I was drawn to this early collage work by Clarence Heyward because of its simplicity, the composition, and gold foil. I’m also very interested in the creative and artistic process. I visited with Clarence in his studio at Artspace many years ago and am fascinated by the way his mind works - what he’s thinking about - and his processes. That connection to the artist - being able to understand their concepts, their processes - adds so much to my appreciation of any artwork. - Gail
32
Stacy Lynn Waddell
Toni Morrison
Burned paper with composition and 22kt gold leaf, 2019
From the Collection of Shirlette Ammons
Stacy offered these small commissioned portraits (via Instagram, maybe?) and I jumped at the opportunity to live with her work. This was a gift for Shirlette the year that Toni Morrison passed. It lives on our mantle and reminds us always of the power of art and the responsibility of artists. - Laura
33
Saba Taj
Wedding
Oil paint and adornments on canvas, 2024
From the Collection of Laura Ritchie & Shirlette Ammons
Shirlette and I saw this work at Saba’s show, Grief Magic, in 2024. It was part of the body of work she created during her Brightwork Fellowship at Anchorlight. It stunned us both, in different ways, and we spent much of the reception looking at it and talking about it. The symmetry and doubling, the ornate surfaces, the symbolism and mythology. It reveals something new each time we encounter it.
- Laura
saba’s solo show, ephemera, opens at Boardinghouse in January 2027.
34
Meg Stein
Broken Bone Kaleidoscope
Bath mats, pencil erasers, pasta, table salt, nylon, plastic spoons, rice, plaster, clay, 2015
From the Collection of Laura Ritchie
35
Warren Hicks
Reflecting on The Carrack
2015
From the Collection of Laura Ritchie
This photo hung unframed in my “office” at The Carrack for many years. It was a view of West Parrish Street that I was very fond of, and it feels sweet to have it framed and on display in this new storefront. Special thanks to Warren for his expertise in installing this show. - Laura