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The Â鶹ÊÓƵ¹ÙÍøÈë¿Ú Department of Art & Design hosts Delita Martin for the Patricia L. Summerville Lecture Series

By Ann Gosser | Aug 19, 2026

MURRAY, Ky. — The Department of Art & Design and the University Galleries at Â鶹ÊÓƵ¹ÙÍøÈë¿Ú is pleased to host Delita Martin as the Patricia L. Summerville Artist in Printmaking on Wednesday, Aug. 26 for an artist lecture and reception in conjunction with her exhibition, Sometimes My Blues Change Colors, in the Clara M. Eagle Gallery. The exhibition will be on view Aug. 26-Oct. 27. The lecture will start at 5 p.m. in Price Doyle Fine Arts room 623 on the 6th floor. An opening reception will immediately follow in the Clara Eagle Gallery, also located on the 6th floor. The lecture and reception are both free and open to the public.

Martin will be on campus Aug. 24-26. During this time she will aid with the installation of her large-scale, mixed media prints. On Tuesday, Aug. 25, she will meet with the advanced printmaking class to discuss the business side of running her studio and career as an artist.

Martin is a master printer and draftswoman whose work explores the beauty and complexity found in the spiritual identities of African American women. Through her mixed-media printmaking practice, which includes the layering of various printmaking processes, drawing, painting, collaging and hand-stitching, Martin celebrates her sitters’ strength and resilience in a world that often overlooks or devalues them. Through her use of pattern, texture and color, she creates immersive veilscapes that are deeply personal yet accessible to viewers. Her distinctive style combines elements of realism, abstractions and symbolism, creating bold portraits of Black women. Martin received a Bachelor of Fine Arts in drawing from Texas Southern University in Houston, Texas and Master of Fine Arts in printmaking from Purdue University, Indiana. Formerly a member of the fine arts faculty at the University of Arkansas at Little Rock, Martin is currently working as a full-time artist in her studio in Huffman, Texas.

Select national and international exhibitions include National Museum of Women in the Arts, Washington, D.C.; Crystal Bridges Museum, Arkansas; the 2022 Venice Biennale exhibition The Afro-Futurist Manifesto: Blackness Reimagined (curated by Myrtis Bedolla of Galerie Myrtis in Baltimore, Maryland, who represents Martin), Italy; Print Association Bentlage Residency Showcase, Kloster Bentlage, Rheine, Germany. Permanent collections include: Bradbury Art Museum, Arkansas; Gorman Museum, California; Crystal Bridges Museum, Arkansas; David Driskell Center, Library of Congress, Washington, D.C.; Minneapolis Institute of Art, Minnesota; Minnesota Museum of American Art; National Museum of Women in the Arts, Washington, D.C.; Petrucci Family Foundation, New Jersey; William J. Clinton Presidential Library and Museum, Arkansas; U.S. Embassy, Nouakchott, Mauritania.

The Patricia L. Summerville Lecture Series is made possible through an endowment to the Department of Art & Design from Patricia Summerville, who graduated from Â鶹ÊÓƵ¹ÙÍøÈë¿Ú in 1972 with a B.S. Ed., after attending the University for only three years. She then earned three additional degrees, including a M.S. Ed., with a major in supervision in 1976 from the University of Akron; a M.H.A., with a major in Hospital Administration in 1982 from Xavier University; and the Juris Doctor from Chase College of Law at Northern Kentucky University in 1994. She was admitted to the bar the following year. Summerville’s career included teaching art for six years, serving as an administrator for hospitals and healthcare facilities for 20 years, and practicing law for five years before retiring in 2003. She passed away in March 2022.

For more information about the Patricia L. Summerville Lecture Series or the Department of Art & Design, contact Nicole Hand at nhandbryant@murraystate.edu.

The University Galleries visitor hours for fall 2026 are Monday, Wednesday and Friday from 8 a.m. to 4:30 p.m., and Tuesday and Thursday from 8 a.m. to 6 p.m. Admission to the galleries is free and open to the public. The University Galleries are located on the sixth and seventh floors of Price Doyle Fine Arts. For more information about the Department of Art & Design, visit or follow them on Instagram @murraystateart.