Three-time Olympian swimmer Lilly King (pictured, from left), award-winning Star Wars cartoonist Jeffrey Brown, and former Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) chief of disguise and best-selling author Jonna Mendez will highlight the University of the Ozarks’ 2025-26 Walton Arts & Ideas Series.
WAIS is made possible by an endowment established by the Walton Family Charitable Support Foundation. All of the events begin at 7 p.m. and there is no charge for admission.
This upcoming academic year’s series will feature six events, including one yet-to-be-determined event in November.
The 2025-26 series begins on Monday, Sept. 8, with a talk from Mendez, who tells her riveting, courageous story of being a female spy at the CIA during the height of the Cold War in the captivating world of intelligence, espionage, and covert operations. She also recounts how she navigated the general culture of sexism at the time while never wavering in her patriotism. Mendez started as a secretary at the CIA and eventually rose to the position of chief of disguise. In the best-selling author’s 2024 book, “In True Face, A Woman’s Life in the CIA, Unmasked,” she inspires with tales of intrigue. Mendez lived undercover for several decades, serving tours of duty in Europe, the Far East, and the subcontinent, as well as at CIA headquarters. In 1970, she joined the CIA’s Office of Technical Service, similar to “Q” in the Bond films. Mendez specialized in training foreign assets to gather high-priority intelligence using subminiature spy cameras and other espionage technology. Now retired after dedicating 27 years of her life to the CIA, she emerges as a pioneer who defied the prevailing sexism of her time.
The series continues on Oct. 21 with a performance by Megha Rao, an accomplished and dedicated artist of Bharatanatyam, a celebrated Indian classical dance form. Rao has more than two decades of experience both as a performer and as a teacher. She is a graded Doordarshan artist and was selected for inclusion on the Arkansas Arts On Tour (AOT) and Arts In Education (AIE) Rosters. She has extended her creative journey in choreography combining many Indian dance forms and she was recently awarded a grant by Artists 360, a program of Mid-America Arts Alliance, to support her Dance production – ‘Baala – tale of Kanha.’ Over the past decade, Rao has captivated the hearts of audiences across the Central U.S at multiple venues. As artistic director, she currently runs the Dhirana Academy of Classical Dance, based in Bentonville, Ark., training over a 100 students in the U.S. every year in Bharatanatyam.
On Feb. 12, 2026, Brown will present a talk titled, “May The Comics Be With You.” Brown is an Eisner award winning cartoonist best known for his best-selling Star Wars graphic novels, including Jedi Academy and the New York Times No. 1 best-seller Darth Vader and Son. A lifelong comics fan, Brown was pursuing his MFA at The School of the Art Institute of Chicago when he abandoned painting to write and draw his first graphic memoir, Clumsy. Since then, he has created dozens of comics and graphic novels, directed an animated video for the band Death Cab For Cutie, co-wrote the screenplay of the film , Save The Date, and exhibited his artwork at galleries in New York, Los Angeles, Paris, and the Museum of Contemporary Art Chicago. Brown will talk about his creative process and everything that goes into writing, drawing, and publishing his books, followed by an audience Q&A session.
The series continues on March 13, 2026, with a performance by the bluegrass band 5 South, an original music roots group from Mountain View, Ark., where old-time music is part of the school curriculum. This group cut their teeth on old time music and is now blazing trails in the bluegrass world. IBMA, Silver Dollar City, HOBA and the Ozark Folk Center are just a few of their favorite stages to play. They recently took second place in the National Youth in Bluegrass competition held in Branson, Missouri for 2025. The band was founded by Kailee Spickes-Jestice, who is a two-time Arkansas State Fiddle Champion and an Arkansas State Banjo Grand Champion. Kailee’s triplet brothers, Chandler, Evan, and Mason, are the band’s rhythm and harmony. This cohesive group has a true love of old-time, gospel and bluegrass music.
The series concludes on April 7, 2026, with a talk by King, a three-time Olympian and breaststroke legend who announced her retirement this summer. King has made three Olympic appearances – 2016, 2020 and 2024. Her breakout came at the 2016 Rio Games, where she won gold in the 100-meter breaststroke and the 400-meter medley relay. At the Tokyo Olympics, King added to her medal haul with a silver in the 200-meter breaststroke and the 400-meter medley relay, along with a bronze in the 100-meter breaststroke. The 2024 Paris Games marked King’s final Olympic appearance. She finished eighth in the 200-meter breaststroke, tied for fourth in the 100-meter breaststroke and closed her Olympic career with a gold medal in the 400-meter medley relay. She set the world record in the 100-meter breaststroke at the 2017 World Championships in Budapest with a 1:04.13, a time that still has yet to be broken.
Topics: WAIS