Don & Maggie Kelley: A Legacy of Love

This exhibition featured the incredible work of two Cincinnati artists who left behind them a large collection of their artwork, an extended community of local creatives, and a lasting impression on the Cincinnati art scene.

Married for nearly 63 years—and practicing fine artists for even longer—the Kelley’s were visionary artists themselves across many disciplines. Don taught at UC’s College of Design, Architecture, Art and Planning for several decades until retiring in 2010, and he worked as an artist in printmaking, drawing, and sculpture. Maggie was a prolific painter, illustrator, musical composer and seriously dabbled in fiber arts—even raising sheep at one point, to harvest her own wool to spin, weave, crochet and felt. Both were nationally recognized artists with a rich community of creatives around them.

Don and Maggie were always in creative conversation with each other through their art making, and—like so many of our V+V artists—shared deep interests in caring for the environment, depicting landscapes, and an abstraction of the human figure.

Artists in V+V studio likewise are motivated by and interested in similar subjects, as well as constantly immersed in creative conversation with each other. V+V studios act as incubators for artists motivated to collaborate and experiment—approaches that aligned with Don and Maggie’s long term vision for their own creative practice.

V+V was fortunate to exhibit a selection of works by both artists from the family’s private collection, alongside a grouping of work by V+V studio artists, co-curated by V+V artist, Nicole Johnson.