Artspeak Radio + Chloe Eddins, Myla McCune, Mattie Rhodes, & Nettie Zan

Artspeak Radio, Wednesday, March 5, 2025, 9am -10am CST, 90.1fm KKFI Kansas City Community Radio, streaming live audio www.kkfi.org

Producer/host Maria Vasquez Boyd welcomes artist/writer/activist Nettie Zan, artists Chloe Eddins & Myla McCune, Christina Loya Mattie Rhodes Public Historian and Activist Angela Ceceña Brunner, Director of Development.

NETTIE ZAN- Are you confused about the gender identity of your family, friends, or colleagues? Join six local queer folks to answer your questions
Are you looking to be the best ally you can be to your genderqueer friends, family, colleagues, and community?
Are you hoping for guidance on pronouns, gendered language, and ways to treat gender non-conforming folks with respect?
Join us for this welcoming and inclusive panel, where five genderqueer locals and Nettie Zan are hosting a question and answer panel for all your confusions and curiousness.
We recognize it may feel difficult to ask folks about what it means to be non-binary, trans, or how to best support genderqueer folks. So we’re making a space for these discussions!
Genderqueer Panel Discussion: helping you be the best ally you can be
Saturday, March 8, 3-5 pm, free
InterUrban ArtHouse, 8001 Newton St OPKS interurbanarthouse.org

Nettie Zan is an artist, writer and communitarian living and working in the red midwest. They are an artist in residence at InterUrban ArtHouse and host of the ArtHouse Open Mic on last sundays. Zan is also a meditation teacher for the KC library, No Divide KC, Amethyst Place, and AIMwell Yoga. They have a new novel coming out soon on Hagstone Books called: at the intersection of hopelessness and salvation. You can find out more at nettiezan.com or follow Nettie on Substack or Blue Sky.

CHLOE EDDINS & MYLA McCune – “HARD EDGE soft thread” Contrasts Roommates Styles Exploring Feminine Complexity
KCAI Seniors Chloe Eddins (’25 Painting) and Myla McCune (’25 Ceramics) collaborated on the exhibition at Vulpes Bastille (1737 Locust Street), opening Friday, March 7, from 6–9 PM.

Femininity is a balance of contrasts: delicate yet strong. Our work honors memories through decoration, exploring growth, decay, preservation, and loss, while reflecting the joy and grief of the feminine experience. Myla transforms textiles into rigid ceramics, creating tension between softness and strength. Chloe uses soft materials and bold details, taking textiles beyond their domestic roots. Both artists explore the contrast between flexible and rigid materials, challenging how we view their purpose. Chloe’s glass swords and Myla’s ceramic tiles embody both fragility and strength. Together, their work highlights the complexities of femininity.
HARD EDGE soft thread will be on display at Vulpes Bastille, with the opening night on March 7 from 6–9 PM. Additional viewing dates are March 8th, 15th, and 22nd, from 1–4 PM.
Chloe Eddins (Senior, Painting) moves a needle swiftly through layers of felt. She’s currently working on a single square, inspired by an image from a short film she made during her junior year, where white figures move in a circle. About a week before the exhibition opens, she’s already completed fifteen similar squares, each featuring a different image. “Fifteen more to go,” she says.

Eddins operates in the realm of fantasy. Growing up, she wanted to be a princess, a vampire, a witch, a mermaid. As she nears the end of her time at the Kansas City Art Institute, she’s leaned into this childhood interest. The felt squares are now becoming a border for a large painting of her embracing a unicorn—an intimate moment, she says. “They haven’t noticed us yet.”
“I wanted to maintain that gentleness in the border and I think that’s why I went with the felt and the tiny stitches and the silver thread. I wanted it to shine and have moments in the sun,” Eddins says.

Myla McCune (Senior, Ceramics) grew up on a pig farm. She dreamed of being a cowgirl, learning all she could about taking care of animals. At 13, when she shared her ambition with her father, she was confronted with a different expectation that shaped her understanding of gender roles.
“The farm was going to my brother. I was supposed to get married,” McCune recalls. Femininity plays a central role in her current work, which retains a country aesthetic through quilting patterns and animal hides. She also crafted a glass piece in the shape of a gun, using a mold made from a firearm she received as a child.
“It was called ‘Baby’s First Rifle.’ It was bright pink. I’d go outside and shoot squirrels for dinner,” McCune says. She doesn’t flinch at the subject of death, having developed a farm-hardened callous to it. “We had this pet pig named Felicia, and one night at dinner, my six-year-old brother asked, ‘How’s Felicia taste?’ That’s when I realized we were eating our pet pig.”

Lately, McCune has been working with animal hides, laser-engraving images onto them. A coyote skin on her studio wall features an image of herself and her mother, burned into the surface. She’s also been busy at Beals Studio, working on cowhide panels, with plans to create a textured quilt. “The process does smell,” she says.
Vulpes Bastille is located at 1737 Locust St. KCMO
vulpesbastille.com

CHRISTINA LOYA, Mattie Rhodes Cultural Center Public Historian and Archivist-Mattie Rhodes Cultural Center is excited to present; Mujer: Poder y Fuerza. We celebrate the strength of women: the struggles, challenges, unconditional love, and the tenacity to travel through adversity, all while being mothers, daughters, sisters, tias, madrinas, comadres, and friends. The sisterhood we carry is what should always bring support, trust, and most of all love to one another. Women/Mujeres today especially need to show the Chingona in themselves and how spectacular and inspiring they truly are.
Mujer: Poder y Fuerza opening reception Friday, March 7, 2025, 6pm – 9pm at Mattie Rhodes Cultural Center located at 1701 Jarboe St. KCMO

Mattie Rhodes Cultural Center
Mujeres Symposium 2025 “Strength & Empowerment”
Saturday, March 15, 9am – 2pm
AGENDA:
9am Check in and Social Hour – Cafe and Conversations
Ollama café de Olla, Pan Dulce from Panadería de Los Américas, Mimosa/Juice bar
– Chicana Charcuterie breakfast style
9am – 1pm Mobile Mammography – Mattie Rhodes partnering with Diagnostic Imaging Centers and Show Me Healthy Women Pre-Registration Onsite
10am Introductions – Jenny Mendez, Cultural Arts Director
10:15am Self Care conversation & Activity (MRC led – will talk with staff to be included 2/21) Gigi Chaurand Kammerer opens – would love to focus on mental health and could include stress management along with hormonal health – any educational and resources that MRC has, etc. Open to any topics or ideas based around women’s health and wellness
11:15am Conversation on the Strength of Women: Cuentos del Corazon – guest speakers that will share their individual experiences and personal stories as mothers, educators, business owners, artists, Chingonas and community leaders; Gigi Chaurand Kammerer, Sue Moreno, Isabel Flores, & Jessica Manco
11:45 Lunch & Learn Conversation continues – participants are given opportunity to shares their own stories – questions on tables to get them thinking
12:45 Corazon Art Activity – participants will create their own Corazon felt ornament to hang as decor or to use as accessory. We will talk about the importance of the heart in art especially in Latinx art and culture
1:45 Close out of program – Reflection and survey
For more information visit www.mattierhodes.org

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