Three years ago when I returned to Houston from art school, I went to a talk for Project Row Houses’ Summer Studios. While there, I saw this tortilla press for tortillas in the shape of cartoon white bread and it made me happy to be back home and excited about the art being made here. [...]
Every writer has her biases and I’m no exception. If someone were to ask me if Abstract Expressionism were my favorite art genre, I would vehemently shake my head “no.” So it surprises me that I’m having such a lovefest with the expressive work of L.A. artist Mark Bradford at the DMA. In fact, this [...]
I stand staring up at Solar Arrangement, Dave Muller’s sprawling mural at Cowboys Stadium. It’s 21 feet tall by 131 feet wide and extends over the bathrooms and the adjacent concession stands with their digital menus touting lipids and libations. Kanye West’s “Power” pulsates in the background. I’m trying to look at the art but [...]
My husband is like the other 99.5% of Americans who go to the movies to be entertained, not to think. So it is with some trepidation that I asked him to accompany me to the Contemplative Cinema event at the Texas Theater earlier this month. The short 45-minute screening and beer allowed in the theater [...]
This last April I attended a curators’ symposium in Austin during the Texas Biennial. It was a day-long series of panel discussions and presentations hosted by Arthouse, right around the time Arthouse was enduring some serious criticism over its censorious and/or irresponsible treatment of two prime exhibitions and of its own confused and confusing treatment [...]
Fort Worth Contemporary Art’s exhibit of Angus Fairhurst’s bronze gorilla sculpture entitled A Couple of Differences Between Thinking and Feeling pays homage to the YBA artist who tragically died in 2008. Post-death, we cannot help but anthropomorphize and project the artist’s depression and loneliness onto the magnificent sculpture. The gorilla, regal in stature, stares at [...]
In the wake of Miami, it seems an appropriate moment to address the economic impact of the art fair. Just before Art Basel and its myriad satellites opened last week, Miami Dade County Newspaper took up the question in “The Art Basel Effect” and concluded yes, for Miami, it worked. Between 2002 and 2010, revenue [...]
There’s a new contest for Texas writers called ARTlines: An Ekphrastic Poetry Competition, sponsored by a new reading series in Houston called Public Poetry in conjunction with the Museum of Fine Arts, Houston. When I first read about the contest, I was excited; I want to support any opportunity for cross-fertilization between writing and visual [...]
Last night I attended the 360 Speaker Series at the Nasher Sculpture Center featuring SMU Art Chair Michael Corris in conversation with famed art critic and author Dore Ashton. I left feeling so energized. Ashton is a gifted storyteller. In relating her experiences with the Abstract Expressionist painters of the 50’s, she made art history [...]
