What would you create if nothing held you back? On Wednesday, artists Kenturah Davis and Dominique Fung joined LYRA Art Foundation founder Tanya Eves, who holds their work in her collection, and CULTURED Editor-in-Chief Sarah Harrelson for a breakfast panel in New York exploring that very question. Most artists face some sort of limitation—be it resources, space, or funding—but LYRA provides the support that ambitious projects demand, so artists can not only dream, but realize.
Through grants and partnerships, LYRA encourages bold, out-of-the-box thinking in artists like Davis, a multidisciplinary creative plumbing cultural histories in her pieces composed with texts, graphite, and oil paints. Meanwhile, painter and sculptor Fung is expanding her practice with the opening of an installation exploring death rituals and excavation at the Institute of Contemporary Art San Francisco, supported by LYRA.
Surrounded by art world leaders brought together by Schwartzman&—from Aspen Art Museum CEO Nicola Lees to art advisor Allan Schwartzman to Whitney Museum Chief Curator Kim Conaty and The Met Modern and Contemporary Art Curator Jane Panetta—the panel, guided by Harrelson, explored how institutions, organizations, and patrons alike can help artists expand beyond their limits.
Sarah Harrelson: As we all know, it’s never easy to make something new. There are unique challenges facing artists today, and that’s why we’ve come together to discuss what it takes for artists to accomplish major projects. We want to explore the relationship between artists, institutions, and how patrons can help facilitate experimentation at a time when funding is tight and aversion to risk is especially high. Tanya, you’ve charted this incredible path as a pilot, an aircraft builder, an aerospace entrepreneur. How did you find your way from aerospace to the world of art?
Tanya Eves: I’m an entrepreneur and I’m also an investor. I was always fascinated by how founders are changing the world around us. That’s the goal of founders—people who are shaping how we live in the world. The second part of the equation is how you see the world. I believe that artists help us to see the world differently, and these two parts should come together for great results.
Tanya Eves, Dominique Fung, and Kenturah Davis
Harrelson: Dominique, you’ve had an exceptional last, I would say, three to five years. You had an amazing commission with the Art Production Fund, and one with the High Line in September. How did you find your way into the art world?
Dominique Fung: I always knew I was an artist, but I never thought that I was actually going to be able to live off of my art. I grew up middle-class in Ottawa, Canada. My parents—not that they weren’t supportive of me doing art—it just wasn’t in the realm of reality, so I ended up studying illustration and graphic design. When I graduated, I actually really wanted to paint. I met this group of artists, and we had this little studio underneath a nail salon in Toronto. There were no windows; it was actually storage units and it was probably illegal to be down there. They showed me, “This is what a museum is. This is what a gallery is,” and I became obsessed and fixated on just making art and finding a way to present art.
My first exhibition was at the Drake Hotel in Toronto. You had to pay $500 to show there, which at the time was all the money I had. I needed to see if this was what I wanted to do, so I paid the $500 and put on this little show. My childhood best friend was the door check person. My sister had the sales list. My parents came in from Ottawa. Bringing together my family and all my friends solidified my desire to make work, and to present it.
Harrelson: After that $500 entry fee, you felt like, “Okay, I can do this.”
Fung: Yeah, I broke even.
Harrelson: At that point, were your parents a little bit more comfortable?
Fung: Absolutely not. They were like, “This is cute, but maybe get a job.” I worked a 9-to-5 for a little bit. I’m not very good with structure and ended up quitting that job. I was freelancing in graphic design during the day, and I was painting in the evenings. I did that for years.
Harrelson: And Kenturah, you have accomplished so much since 2018. I would love to hear how your path into being an artist started. What were the challenges?
Kenturah Davis: I grew up in a family of creatives. They’re all really supportive, so I know I’m really fortunate in that way. My dad was a set painter for TV and film for most of my childhood, and my mom was a quilt-maker. It was just encouraging. I can’t remember a time where I didn’t want to be an artist, and my dad’s path showed me that there could be a career. I didn’t know what the art world was. If you’re a set painter, you’re not in the art world. There’s some overlap, but it’s very different. College opened some things up.
Harrelson: Your undergrad studies were in art and anthropology.
Davis: Yes, at Occidental College. Then, I took a big gap between that and graduate school, working for a print publisher, Gemini G.E.L., so I got to meet many of my favorite artists. That opened things up to the art world. I truly saw what it was for the first time when I worked there, then left and moved to Ghana, then came back for school.
Harrelson: Do you want to talk a little bit about Nxthvn and Titus Kaphar’s program? That teaches you a lot about so much more than art, right?
Davis: I went to Yale for my MFA. Titus also went to Yale, and he started putting together this residency called Nxthvn. I met him during my time in the program and applied. Part of its mission is to help fill the gaps of what MFA programs typically don’t address, which is how to live, more than just making your practice. It’s about brass tacks, accounting. There are a lot of connections made with people coming to visit the studios, but how do you facilitate productive studio visits? Things like that were tremendously helpful.
Harrelson: Dominique, I read that when they approached you to do the project for the High Line, you first said, “I don’t think I’m the person for the job.” You had, at least, several years of a painting and sculpture practice that did not include performance. Ambitious projects are such an important part of developing as an artist. I would love to hear all about that process, the challenges, and whether you were happy with it in the end?
Fung: Performance wasn’t something I felt comfortable with or thought that I could do, but Taylor [Zakarin] really reassured me that they have a team behind them, saying “Just think of anything and we’ll make it happen.”
Something that I’ve always dreamed of doing is some form of theater production or film. I spent time in Beijing earlier this year, and I learned from tea masters while I was there how to pour tea, how to steep tea, how tea is made, and how it’s fermented. I decided to incorporate that into the performance. While doing that, I walked the High Line with Taylor several times. I had seen these guides that were with several people, teaching them about horticulture and the plants on the High Line.
I thought it would be interesting to make a character who is guiding you as you’re walking, but in the same way, they’re guiding you through this tea experience. It was a seven-scene play. This is the first time I’ve ever written a script. We spent two weeks casting, doing costumes, and for set design. It was an incredible experience.
Kenturah Davis
Sonder, 2015-18
Harrelson: I was so struck by what you did with the LA Metro, Kenturah, and your goal to encourage strangers to communicate, which seems like such a simple goal but, at the same time, near impossible. I can’t believe how long that project took. You said that was a five-to-seven-year project, and I can’t imagine what it was working like with the LA Metro and the city of LA.
Davis: At the time that I threw my name in the hat for the project, I was a young thing. This was back in 2014. I didn’t have high expectations, so I was really surprised. I had moved to Ghana, and I got a call that I won. I think it was the best situation I could have had at that stage of my career. The parameters are really tight; I had to create a 2D image that would sit elevated on the platform. You think through what your version of doing this thing is, and that’s what a lot of artists do—try to pinpoint how these parameters meet [your] own practice.
A big part of my practice is drawing the figure. Growing up in LA, public transportation is nothing like it is here. In fact, when I was a teen and came to New York for the first time, it was such an eye-opening experience that for a while, I entertained becoming an urban planner as a backup plan. Just thinking about, What does the public experience offer? What is the most ideal experience one might have? I basically photographed people encountering strangers, then made composite images and drew those.
Harrelson: It lived there for how long?
Davis: Permanently.
Harrelson: Incredible. Tanya, what was your first encounter with Dominique and Kenturah’s work?
Eves: I was introduced to the artists through their work, which is in my collection. Since then, through my philanthropic organization, we have been connected. LYRA Art Foundation is working with different art institutions including ICA San Francisco, since we provided a grant for their curator, Meghan Smith. Meghan told me Dominique had some exciting plans, and they had an idea for a joint exhibition between Dominique and another great artist, Heidi Lau, who is here with us today. It’s one of the most amazing things, to not just to collect art, but also to make an impact. I love to see how people are developing and pushing themselves further. I want to help artists reach their most ambitious goals; this is the mission at LYRA. I am excited to see Dominque’s and Heidi’s exhibition come to life next year.
Harrelson: So Dominique, how are you taking it to the next level?
Fung: Alison Gass, who is here, told me to dream big. When I first presented my project, I told her I wanted to make this excavation set-up, like an archaeological burial site, similar to those in Dunhuang in China. I wanted the ground to be the sites and the walls to have indents in them where you can place objects throughout the museum. When I presented it to her, I thought she was going to say no, but she said yes. So we’re going to be trucking in dirt into the museum, which I’m sure everybody’s thrilled about.
Harrelson: Kenturah, I was also in Los Angeles during the fires and saw the destruction in Altadena. I was swept away by your show “Ode to ‘Dena” at the California African American Museum. You had works from your son. You had works from your dad. How were you able to put together a show with so much emotion during such a traumatic time?
Davis: I can’t quite take credit for putting together the show. There’s a really wonderful independent curator, Dominique Clayton and an amazing collector, Joy Simmons, who are involved with the museum. Charles White was there, John Outterbridge, Octavia Butler. Betye Saar lived there for a while. There’s a really rich history.
I lost my home and part of my studio. My parents lost their home. We were scrambling, but the California African American Museum is a little more nimble in terms of programming. Many museums have their shows planned out for two to three years, but they were able to pivot quickly. They pulled this show together. My mom had her quilts in there. Since my dad retired from the film industry, he’s been making these paintings. He would do these en plein air paintings, and now he has this visual archive of watercolors of what Altadena and Pasadena have been.
I have my three-year-old now, and from a young age we’ve been showing him how to paint. My dad made him a little watercolor kit. I threw out the idea of including a couple of those paintings, and they said yes, so he’s the youngest artist to display at the California African American Museum.
Dominique Fung, A Leaf’s Pilgrimage, 2025
A High Line Performance. Photography by Walter Wlodarczyk and courtesy of the High Line
Harrelson: As artists, both of you have made it a real priority to make work outside of the market and push beyond conventional boundaries. Tanya, you’ve been fearless in your career and your philanthropy. Is there anything that you’ve all learned about taking risks, or a moment of breakthrough in these high-tension moments?
Eves: For me, failure is always an opportunity. Everybody has failures. The question is: what is your approach? How do you grow and learn from this to move forward? I am always positive; everything is a worthwhile learning experience..
Fung: I think pushing through fear and the unknown in the moment is uncomfortable, but usually it is the most rewarding thing to do. With the High Line, even with the Rockefeller Center project with Art Production Fund, those are both projects that were outside of my normal art practice—but they have been the most rewarding.
Davis: Our jobs are inherently full of risk because we’re stepping out on faith to make these things. Even if you’re super successful, you never really know how it’s going to meet the world, when it’s going to meet the world, if it’s going to meet the world. What I’m embarking on, especially post-fire, is probably the biggest expansion of the territory I’ve considered as my practice: starting a garden project throughout Altadena as the community starts to rebuild. In the risk, there’s something about finding your center. I’ve always been interested in design and applying those things to new situations and challenges.
Harrelson: One last question: what is the most meaningful thing that you received to support your career?
Davis: I don’t want to say the obvious, which is money [laughs]. I have to say thank you to Tanya, because you heard how I was affected by the fires and reached out to me, and you all supported me.
But talking about how the show came together, there’s a whole ecosystem in art that isn’t always about money, but just support, rallying, and making connections. That can look so different. It means people are being creative about how we make sustained connections with each other, and making great things happen.