Glasstire counts down the top five art events in Texas.
For last week’s picks, please go here.
Alma Thomas, “Alma’s Flower Garden,” 1968-1970, acrylic on canvas, 34 1/4 x 50 inches.
1. Black Abstractionists: From Then ‘Til Now
Green Family Art Foundation (Dallas)
October 8, 2022 – January 29, 2023
From the Green Family Art Foundation:
“Black Abstractionists: From Then ‘til Now, curated by Dexter Wimberly, focuses on Black abstract artists spanning multiple generations, starting in the 1960s with Alma Thomas and ending with young artists working today, such as Michaela Yearwood-Dan and Vaughn Spann. The history of Black artists working in abstraction is inseparable from the history of modern and contemporary art.
Featured artists: Alma Thomas, Hale Woodruff, Beauford Delaney, Charles Alston, Norman Lewis, Thornton Dial, Jack Whitten, Ed Clark, Sam Gilliam, Frank Bowling, Daniel LaRue Johnson, Virginia Jaramillo, Melvin Edwards, David Hammons, Howardena Pindell, Mary Lovelace O’Neal, William T. Williams, McArthur Binion, Fred Eversley, Stanley Whitney, Glenn Ligon, Leonardo Drew, Rick Lowe, Kevin Beasley, Spencer Lewis, Oscar Murillo, Reginald Sylvester II, Rachel Jones, Vaughn Spann, Gabriel Mills, Jadé Fadojutimi, and Michaela Yearwood-Dan.”
K8 HARDY, installation view of “March through June,” 2022.
2. K8 HARDY: March through June
Artpace (San Antonio)
November 17, 2022 – January 8, 2023
From Artpace:
“K8 Hardy is ‘happy to confuse, amuse, and activate’ viewers of her art, and her new work created while on residency at Artpace may do just that. Upon entering the white cube gallery, her singular work, a painting, counters with its dark organic presence.
The monumental work, June, is suspended upon a building pilar in the center of the gallery. It is a soft sculpture awash with splashes of blacks, blues, and a few hints of colors creating a heavy substrate to absorb light. Periodically, a bit of glitter reflects our gaze within the gestural fluid paint strokes.
June continues Hardy’s work in a series she began in 2020 and it is her third painting. As with each work, Hardy experiments with both material and palette. This work was designed by Hardy in the studio, constructed at a San Antonio car upholstery company, and returned to the studio for a poured paint process by the artist. Consistent within her series is the shape, with a perimeter of elongated soft round edges and small wings, and the dimensions, with a thicker cushion at the middle tapering to a comfortable softness near the edges.”
Pat Colville, “Jasper Mountain XIII,” 2022, acrylic on paper, 22 x 15 inches.
3. PAT COLVILLE: JASPER MOUNTAIN
Moody Gallery (Houston)
November 5 – December 24, 2022
From Moody Gallery:
“Pat Colville (b. New Orleans, Louisiana, 1931) currently lives and works in Houston, Texas and previously lived in New York City for thirty-five years. Her work holds a commitment to abstraction and is influenced by early Asian landscape paintings. Jasper Mountain, Colville’s seventh exhibition at Moody Gallery, will include new paintings and works on paper created during the Covid-19 pandemic.”
Gary Webernick, “Falling Temple.”
4. Gary Webernick: True Stories & Divine Accidents
Lydia Street Gallery (Austin)
November 12 – December 23, 2022
From Lydia Street Gallery:
“Artist Statement: I most often use light, sound and motion combined with photographs and found objects to create a multi-media environment. When compelled, I add personal narrative and political/social comment to my work. I use both 2 and 3-dimensional formal elements, but often create work that takes a critical view of social, political and cultural issues, often using historical references combined with popular culture. My subjects are diverse with layered concepts; the subject matter usually determines what materials and techniques I will use. Found objects and materials appear in much of my work—the objects often drive the direction I will take both technically and conceptually. Currently, I am continuing to pursue the process of combining photographs with other materials (often found) to create three-dimensional reliefs.”
Rodrigo Valenzuela, “Weapon #11.”
5. Rodrigo Valenzuela: Creatures of the Grind
Assembly (Houston)
November 18, 2022 – January 8, 2023
From Assembly:
“Assembly is pleased to present Creatures of the Grind, an exhibition of new works by Rodrigo Valenzuela, guest curated by art historian, writer, and curator Paula Kupfer. About the exhibition, Kupfer writes:
‘Once knives and screws and drill bits, rope and chains—the tools of many trades—they appear here reconfigured as phoenixes, ramshackle sculptures, animistic creatures of dreams that are both latent objects for political struggle and formidable, animal-like apparitions. These works from Rodrigo Valenzuela’s most recent Weapons series are part of the artist’s ongoing investigation into issues of labor. Through a patina of nostalgic fantasy, they offer views of the imaginative performance that might take place on the job site once laborers depart.
Works from the artist’s previous series, Afterwork, present somber, silvery rooms filled with peculiar machines and smoke, possibly the sweat left hanging in the air after a long day’s work. In Weapons, Valenzuela proposes a more surrealist and metaphysical dimension. In Afterwork, the implements of daily toil reassemble, seemingly of their own devising, into zoomorphic creatures that are more than the sum of their parts. With haunting presence, they occupy the center stage of large-scale photographs with mural-like composition.’”
