May 17 - June 21, 2025
From Hooks-Epstein Galleries:
“Hooks-Epstein Galleries presents Piano Pieces, an exhibition of assemblage wall pieces by Texas-based artist, Ward Sanders. The exhibition will open at 11:00 A.M. on Saturday, May 17, 2025. A book signing with The Art of Found Objects: Interviews with Texas Artists author Robert Craig Bunch will take place from 2:00–4:00 P.M., followed by the Exhibition Opening Reception from 5:00-7:00 P.M.
Ward Sanders explores the lingering presence of music through the physical remnants of early 20th-century instruments in Piano Pieces. The concept of the exhibition emerged after Sanders dismantled two upright pianos and an old pump organ from this era of the early 1900s; he was struck by the sense that the soul of the music still resided in their worn and weathered parts.
The interplay of the observable and the imagined forms the foundation for Piano Pieces; with this body of work, Sanders seeks to restore a sense of dignity and presence to the once-sounding mechanisms. Drawing on the structure and repetition found in musical composition, each piece becomes a visual opus—a variation on a theme—assembled from the same source materials and united by a quiet reverence for their shared history. The result is a visual symphony—works that resonate with memory, materiality, and the silent echo of sound once played.
Ward Sanders earned a B.S. in Biology at Sul Ross University (Alpine, TX) and completed his postgraduate studies at the University of Arizona. He was a high school educator in Biology and Art for 33 years in Houston, Lytle, and San Antonio. In 2018, Sanders participated in the group exhibitions, The Art of Found Objects: Enigma Variations, at the Art Museum of Southeast Texas (Beaumont, TX) and Art Vinyl at the McNay Art Museum (San Antonio, TX). His work is in numerous private and public art collections. Sanders was featured in both of Robert Craig Bunch’s publications, The Art of Dreams, Visions, Other Worlds: Interviews with Texas Artists and The Art of Found Objects: Interviews with Texas Artists. “
Special event: May 17, 2025 | 2–4 pm
Robert Craig Bunch + Artists Book Signing
Reception: May 17, 2025 | 5–7 pm
2631 Colquitt Street
Houston, 77098 TX
713-522-0718
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