SKYCTC Art Gallery to Present Sisavanh Phouthavong Houghton Exhibition, When Sorrows Come

BOWLING GREEN, Ky. – The Laura Goad Turner Charitable Foundation Art Gallery at Southcentral Kentucky Community and Technical College (SKYCTC) will present When Sorrows Come, Oct. 26-Dec. 10, a visiting artist exhibition featuring the work of internationally exhibited Lao American artist Sisavanh Phouthavong Houghton.

Phouthavong Houghton will discuss her work at a public artist talk from 11:15 a.m. to 12:15 p.m. Monday, Oct. 26, followed by an opening reception from 12:15 to 1:30 p.m. Both events take place in SKYCTC’s Robert and Mary Tincher Campus and Community Center, 1845 Loop Drive, Bowling Green.

“We’re excited to welcome Sisavanh Phouthavong Houghton as our first regional visiting artist,” said Gallery Director Leslie Nichols. “There’s no better way to experience visual art than with the artist in the room. We hope community members in Bowling Green will join our students, faculty and staff for the talk and reception to be part of the conversation.”

Phouthavong Houghton is a Lao American interdisciplinary visual artist and Professor of Studio Arts in Painting at Middle Tennessee State University. Drawing in part on her own experience as a Lao refugee in the aftermath of the Vietnam War, she explores the lasting legacy of war, displacement, memory and resilience.

The exhibition takes its title from Shakespeare’s Hamlet: “When sorrows come, they come not single spies but in battalions.” Its layered paintings bring together fragmented landscapes, geometric forms, archival images and contemporary visual references to consider how war shapes personal and cultural identity across generations.

In her artist statement, Phouthavong Houghton writes that the recent paintings “critically examine the visual and ethical parallels between military drones and avian predators in contemporary warfare.” Using real-time drone footage and commemorative imagery from ongoing conflicts, including the war in Ukraine, the series considers how war is waged, surveilled, and mediated in the digital age.

Phouthavong Houghton has exhibited in the United States and abroad, including at the Frist Art Museum in Nashville, the Knoxville Museum of Art and the Susquehanna Art Museum. Her work is in the permanent collections of the Hunter Museum of American Art and the American Embassy in Paramaribo, Suriname, among others, and she is represented by Tinney Contemporary in Nashville.

The exhibition is part of the gallery’s ongoing effort to bring professional artists to the SKYCTC campus.

Exhibition Details

What: When Sorrows Come
Artist: Sisavanh Phouthavong Houghton
Exhibition Dates: Oct. 26-Dec. 10, 2026
Artist Talk: 11:15 a.m.-12:15 p.m., Monday, Oct. 26
Opening Reception: 12:15-1:30 p.m., Monday, Oct. 26
Location: Laura Goad Turner Charitable Foundation Art Gallery, Robert and Mary Tincher Campus and Community Center, SKYCTC, 1845 Loop Drive, Bowling Green, Ky.
Gallery Hours: Monday-Friday, 8 a.m.-4 p.m.

The exhibition and opening events are free and open to the public.