Andrea Grover

Phil Ross (San Francisco) works in the realm of “biotechniques.” He makes sculptural and architectural works from plants and fungi, and videos about live cultures. As the founder and director…

In his 2011 non-fiction book, Moonwalking with Einstein, author Joshua Foer befriends the professional “memory athlete” Ed Cooke who suggests to him that you can slow down subjective time by…

On March 3-4, 2011, I attended the “Art as a Way of Knowing” conference at Exploratorium, San Francisco, the legendarily creative, hands-on science museum founded by Dr. Frank Oppenheimer in…

Earlier this year, I simultaneously read Jaron Lanier’s You Are Not A Gadget and Steven B. Johnson’s Everything Bad Is Good for You, and found it, as you can imagine, confounding. Lanier argues that digital…

On November 11, 2010, the San Francisco Chronicle reported that some of the biggest names in technology, media and fine art are coming together to support Art.sy, a Pandora Radio-type…

Sometimes the activities one assumes are just pleasant diversions from the real substance of life produce almost sacred experiences. Such is the case with the free "Bounce" workshop, led by…

“How much does your house weigh?” – R. Buckminster Fuller The late American architect and inventor R. Buckminster Fuller was famous for seeing the world through an uncommon lens, a…

During the ten years that I was with Aurora Picture Show, I hosted at least 300 visiting artists, and gave almost that many tours of Houston. Like an old cabbie,…

This past weekend I attended a screening of short films, Pirate Utopias, curated by Sean Uyehara at San Francisco International Film Festival. The program, which was described as “a systematic…

Art & Boats is my ongoing series of interviews and stories about artists who build boats, sail, explore and challenge themselves on the water. For background on Art & Boats,…

And you may find yourself living in a shotgun shack And you may find yourself in another part of the world And you may find yourself behind the wheel of…

I have a recurring dream that I discover a hidden room, floor or entire wing in my existing home. The expansive imaginary space defies Newtonian Physics, and the ornate architectural…

“Buffet” Whets the Appetite “There’s slime in the ice machine” is a Houston saying made popular by the late TV personality Marvin Zindler, a white-suited, surgically-enhanced, makeup wearing investigative reporter…

One of the potential hazards of moving to a small town is that you may end up the Mayor. Such is the case with Travis Whitfield, an artist who was…

I’ve got nautical kitsch and art all mixed up in my head. As the daughter of a boat builder and an artist, I have a Pavlovian response to anything that…

I just got word from Javier Fadul at Culture Pilot that Houston is hosting a TEDx event on June 12, 2010. TEDx is the newly launched mini-me of the TED…

With the Climate Change Summit wrapping-up in Copenhagen, and it not looking so pretty for the future of this blue planet, I recently made tentative “end of the world” plans…

What to make of The First Annual Rob Pruitt Art Awards which took place on October 29, 2009 at The Guggenheim Museum in association with White Columns and Calvin Klein…

Cinema Arts Festival Houston , "the only U.S. festival devoted to films by and about artists," launches November 11-15, 2009. When two New York real estate promoters, commonly known as…

On October 19, 2009, performance artists, The Yes Men, held a fake US Chamber of Commerce press conference at The National Press Club. A small assembly of journalists listened attentively…