Top Five: December 21, 2023

Glasstire counts down the top five art events in Texas.

For last week’s picks, please go here.

1. This Land
The Contemporary Austin
September 28, 2023 – January 28, 2024

From the Contemporary Austin:

“The Contemporary Austin presents This Land, a group exhibition exploring the social and ecological effects of colonialism and capitalism on people’s relationships to land and place, while also speaking to the changing landscape of Austin. This Land features dynamic, multidisciplinary artworks in a range of media by five artists in their Austin debuts: Vivian Caccuri, Raven Chacon, Minerva Cuevas, Danielle Dean, and Jamilah Sabur.

This Land brings together artists from regions across the Americas whose works address topics including histories and mythologies of place, migration and displacement, and exploitations of labor and resources while encouraging reflection on how the past, present, and future are intertwined.”

2. Bernardo Vallarino: Hard on Guns, Gold & God
Arlington Museum of Art
October 20, 2023 – January 7, 2024

From the Arlington Museum of Art:

“Announcing the opening of a new solo exhibition by Texas-based Colombian-American mixed-media sculptor and installation artist, Bernardo Vallarino. Titled Hard on Guns, Gold & God, this exhibition is a thought-provoking and immersive experience that explores the complex and interconnected themes of armed violence, the paradoxical valuation of human life, and religion.

Hardon Guns, Gold & God will feature a group of comprehensive multidisciplinary artworks bridging a decade of Vallarino’s career to his new artistic direction. The exhibition will bring together a series of sculptural works that invite viewers to engage with profound and often uncomfortable questions about our society, values, and beliefs.”

3. Jennifer Ling Datchuk & Tammie Rubin: Press Hold On The Hand
Ruiz-Healy Art (San Antonio)
November 29, 2023 – January 6, 2024

From Ruiz-Healy Art:

“Ruiz-Healy Art is pleased to present Jennifer Ling Datchuk & Tammie Rubin: Press Hold On The Hand, a two-person exhibition. Jennifer Ling Datchuk and Tammie Rubin share a language and depth of materials rooted in domesticity, migrations, and hope. Press Hold On The Hand takes a look at our collective and cumulative grief, both personally and globally, and asks viewers to pause, reflect, and take stock of the signs and affirmations that keep us moving forward. Datchuk presents a series of sculptures using materials such as porcelain, wire, and human hair, that decorate the walls with their ornamentation. Using intricate motifs, Rubin’s work delves into themes involving ritual, domestic and liturgical objects.”

4. Devin T. Mays: Underneath Echoes
Car Wash (Houston)
December 8 – 30, 2023

From the Car Wash:

“The work of Devin T. Mays directs our attention to presence. He investigates site, as both a physical space for intervention where bodies coalesce and simultaneously as a conceptual gradient of social gesture(s). He conjures memory and possibility through the fragmentation and repetition of readymade objet trouvés, sound, text, and lens based media. This is his first exhibition with the Car Wash.”

5. Works In Progress II
Co-Opts Research + Projects (Lubbock)
December 3, 2023 – February 18, 2024

From Co-Opts Research + Projects:

“CO-OPt Research + Projects, as an artist-run space, opened in July 2019 with an exhibition of works in progress by its founding members. Now four years on, we present a second exhibition of works in progress by our current members.

Works In Progress II serves as a re-introduction to the artist-members of CO-OPt and the function of the space as a working artist studio, featuring work by J. Eric Simpson, Aaron Hegert, Cody Arnall, Heather Warren-Crow, and Justin Houser.”