MAX HOT, a new exhibition of textile works by Coulter Fussell, will be on display at Southside Gallery August 27 – September 26. The exhibition will feature 23 new works. MAX HOT comes on the heels of THE PROVING GROUND, a retrospective exhibition at the Mississippi Museum of Art. This will be Fussell’s first gallery exhibition since her May 2024 Southside Gallery solo show, 24 FLOWERS: A DAY. Fussell’s opening reception is scheduled for Thursday, August 27. 5:30 – 8:30 PM. She will also be in the gallery for a SouthsidexSide artist talk and book signing (in collaboration with Square Books) on Tuesday, September 15 at 5:30 PM. Copies of COULTER FUSSELL: THE PROVING GROUND can be purchased in advance at Square Books or on the night of the signing.

MAX HOT is a highly anticipated exhibition, marking the first opportunity for collectors to see an entire body of work focusing on Fussell’s custom-printed chiffon fabric, featuring images of photographs and Kodachrome slides made by her father and screenshots taken from her teenage sons’ Snapchat videos. Fussell composes layers of donated and found textiles beneath the translucent chiffon. Many of the works are also upholstered. These methods give them a degree of three - dimensionality, harkening back to Fussell’s use of lenticular postcards from her WAR QUILTS series. The “donated” photos and screenshots carry on the legacy of Fussell’s practice of working with donated textiles, a signature characteristic of her work. Themes of chance, luck, and tension, often explored by the artist, are on full display in this collection. Fussell has zeroed in on the things that intrigue her most.

Bold, bright colors, another mainstay in Fussell’s work, are at the forefront of MAX HOT. These exciting compositions share a symbiotic relationship with the viewer, where both crave attention from the other. Fussell’s luscious florals, her blood red tondos, and her radiating purple upholsteries demand to be looked at, lusted after, and desired. Boundaries of color and temperature in the landscapes of MAX HOT are tested and pushed beyond excess. The show is aptly titled.

Coulter Fussell was born and raised in Columbus, Georgia, a “mill town” in the southwestern region of the state. Fussell’s childhood experiences traveling with her father (a folklorist, artist, documentary photographer, and museum curator) and mother (a quilter and educator) around the region factor prominently in her work. Memories of Columbus have shaped the way Coulter sees the world. Her landscapes, even those set in Mississippi (her home for more than 25 years), are indebted to her Columbus upbringing.

Coulter moved to Mississippi in 1997 and has been there since. She maintains a studio and lives in the small rural town of Water Valley, Mississippi, located in the northwestern region of the state. Locals there leave donations of (but not limited to) textiles, muscadine wine, discarded doll parts, quilts, furniture, and appliances at her gallery door most weeks of the year. These donations, barring the wine, nearly always make it into the work.

Coulter’s career as a textile artist began over a decade ago and has ascended quickly. She was the 2017 ArtsSouth Southern Prize Finalist. In 2019 she received a United States Artist Fellowship. This was followed by the 2021 Jane Crater Hiatt Fellowship from the Mississippi Museum of Art. More recently, she was a Yaddo Fellow (2025), had a major retrospective exhibition at The Mississippi Museum of Art (2026), and was the recipient of Creative Capital/State of the Art funding (2026). This August (2026), Coulter was named a Joan Mitchell Fellow and Hermitage Fellow.

Her work, often sharply focused on specific events, moods, conflicts, interpersonal relationships, and connections with the natural world can also be interpreted more broadly, for these topics are microcosms of timeless subjects such as the human spirit -- failures, triumphs, history, and potential all included.