Gallery Open:
November 9 - December 11, 2026
Artist Talk and Reception:
Thursday, November 19, 2026
5:00 pm
Carlos Gallery
The Carlos Gallery in the Visual Art Building at the University of the South is pleased to present (un)obstructed migratory routes, a solo exhibition by Alexis Hagestad.
Hagestad, a photographer with roots in western Montana, explores the photographic image from a non-human perspective, questioning photography’s tradition of human control. (un)obstructed migratory routes examines migration paths for borderland species by collaborating with bat echolocation to create photographs. Mexican free-tailed bats migrate annually between Mexico, Central America, and maternity colonies in the southern United States. On their journey, some cross Arizona’s San Rafael Valley, a biodiverse wildlife corridor threatened by border wall construction. Using an audio-reactive system that converts their calls into light, the bats expose each image within the darkroom. This process questions photography’s tradition of human control by making bats active collaborators in the prints’ final form.
The work in (un)obstructed migratory routes shares authorship with the Mexican free-tailed bats, creating space for nonhuman intelligence, multispecies understanding, and ways of considering migration, agency, and ecological connection. As the bats’ voices shape each print, space is created for forms of intelligence beyond the human, helping viewers learn from these species through collaboration. The resulting photographs create an opportunity to consider alternative modes of migration, agency, and ecological connection as a bridge to multispecies understanding. Hagestad says, “Interweaving my human-made photographs with bats’ echolocation and their free-moving migration patterns helps me reconsider my place within ecosystems, the delicate webs of existence that rely on each other for survival.”
Alexis Hagestad is currently a Visiting Assistant Professor of Photography and Video at the University of the South in Sewanee, Tennessee. Hagestad holds an MFA in Studio Art with an emphasis in Photography, Video, and Imaging from the University of Arizona, and a BFA in Photography from the Savannah College of Art and Design. In 2025, she received the Marcia Grand Centennial Sculpture Prize from the University of Arizona School of Art and was named a Carson Scholar through the Arizona Institute of Resilience.
More of Hagestad’s work can be viewed online at https://ajhagestad.com
Carlos Gallery
University of the South
Visual Art Building
105 Kennerly Rd.
Sewanee, Tennessee
Gallery Hours: Monday – Friday, 8 AM – 5 PM
Contact: Jessica Wohl
jewohl@sewanee.edu
