CAC / UAG / ROOM Galleries

On view through this Saturday, May 2: 2026 MFA Thesis Exhibition, Part I.

Visit the solo exhibitions by our third-year MFA candidates:

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1. Substrate —> Spasm by Simon Klein — Room Gallery
2. We Begin to Wilt Beneath the Son by Gwyneth Bulawsky — University Art Gallery
3. Catastrophe by Jacob Lenc — Contemporary Arts Center Gallery

And opening Saturday, May 9, 2–5 PM: Part II, featuring solo exhibitions by Teresa Ho, David Ditman, and Cecil Yuzhe Zhang.

Photos by Yubo D**g /

𝘈𝘳𝘵𝘪𝘴𝘵 𝘴𝘱𝘰𝘵𝘭𝘪𝘨𝘩𝘵: Virgil B/G Taylor

𝘍𝘢𝘨 𝘛𝘪𝘱𝘴 𝘧𝘰𝘳 𝘏𝘶𝘮𝘢𝘯 𝘙𝘪𝘨𝘩𝘵𝘴 𝘉𝘢𝘣𝘺 (2025) draws from Taylor’s speculative 𝘍𝘢𝘨 𝘛𝘪𝘱𝘴 𝘜𝘵𝘰𝘱𝘪𝘢 𝘡𝘪𝘯𝘦 and his essay The Human Rights Baby (2020), which considers the persistent figure of innocent Western humanism and its attachment to an infantile present. As Taylor writes: “The baby, like its witnesses, is looking out for nothing in particular… you have to actively push that past aside.”

The installation’s vinyl banner disrupts the grid that renders text, bodies, and land legible and governable. Through typography, fragmentation, and the banner’s collapsing surface, meaning emerges between folds rather than within stable forms. Positioned behind the banner, a photograph by Jackie Martin documents a lamination foil stunt by Frances Benedict, a preservation worker at the U.S. National Archives in the 1940s.

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1–3: Installation views of Fag Tips for Human Rights Baby (details) by virgil b/g taylor, CAC Gallery, UC Irvine, 2026. Photographs by Paul Salveson.

This exhibition inaugurates the first phase of 𝘛𝘩𝘦 𝘕𝘦𝘨𝘢𝘯𝘵𝘩𝘳𝘰𝘱𝘰𝘤𝘦𝘯𝘦: 𝘌𝘮𝘱𝘪𝘳𝘦/𝘔𝘰𝘯𝘦𝘺, 𝘚𝘤𝘪𝘦𝘯𝘤𝘦/𝘗𝘰𝘭𝘪𝘵𝘪𝘤𝘴, 𝘈𝘳𝘵/𝘐𝘯𝘵𝘦𝘳𝘷𝘦𝘯𝘵𝘪𝘰𝘯, a three-part research project within the University of California Climate Action Arts Network (UC CAAN), a system-wide initiative bringing together researchers, artists, students, and communities to confront the climate crisis through the arts. UC CAAN is supported by the UC Office of the President MRPI grant program.

This exhibition is on view until April 4, 2026 at the Contemporary Arts Center (CAC) Gallery, UC Irvine. Featuring works by Marwa Arsanios , Ashley Hunt , Natascha Sadr Haghighian, and Virgil B/G Taylor
Curated by Juli Carson , Annika Haas .s, and Sasha Ussef

Read more: uag.arts.uci.edu