Blaffer Gallery
University of Houston
120 Fine Arts Building
TX 77204-4018
Houston, TX
Texas
North America
p: 713 743 9528
m:
f: 713 743 9525
w: www.blaffergallery.org
Seth Alverson, Death and Life in the Alps, 2007 Oil on canvas, 60 x 84 in. Courtesy the artist
Blaffer Gallery to Showcase Latest Work from Local Artists
2008 Houston Area Exhibition on View May 10 through Aug. 2, 2008
HOUSTON, Texas -- April 29, 2008 -- Blaffer Gallery, the Art Museum of the University of Houston, is pleased to continue its 35th anniversary season with the 2008 Houston Area Exhibition. The exhibition will be on view at Blaffer Gallery, located in the Fine Arts Building on the University of Houston's central campus, from May 10 through Aug. 2, 2008. Several events will take place at the museum in conjunction with the show, including an opening reception on May 9 and a Contemporary Salon on July 16. Both events begin at 6 p.m.
The exhibition, selected by Blaffer Gallery curator Claudia Schmuckli, introduces artists who are young or new to the Houston community and offers more seasoned artists the opportunity to develop new work and to be seen in a fresh light. Featuring Seth Alverson, William Betts, Sasha Dela, Jonathan Durham, Hana Hillerova, Hedwige Jacobs, Andres Janacua, Nicholas Kersulis, Mindy Kober, Jonathan Leach, Lynne McCabe, Ariane Roesch, Julie Spielman, Gabriela Trzebinski, Jeff Williams and Audry Worster, the 16 artists in the exhibition were chosen through careful portfolio review and a series of on-site studio visits.
"We are pleased to present the public with a glimpse of the great talent living and working in this city," stated Schmuckli. "The issues put forth in the works in the show vary, but what connects all of the artists is an active engagement with ideas and concerns that define life in this particular contemporary moment -- be it as an individual, a society or a nation."
Held every four years, the Houston Area Exhibition offers a snapshot of what matters to local artists in the here and now, and has been a part of Blaffer since the museum's inception.
About the Artists and Featured Works:
Seth Alverson's paintings of vacant rooms, open coffins and funeral parlors serve as metaphors for his disappointment in academia as an institution for the generation of ideas. But the symbolic declaration of academia's death is also the recognition of its loss. As with any death, those who remain behind are left with a vacuum impossible to fill. Based on surveillance imagery, William Betts's machine produced paintings of highways and urban scenes are a matter-of-fact reminder that national security and individual rights to privacy are becoming increasingly incompatible in these times of uncertainty.
Sasha Dela's objects and installations made of found recyclable materials address the problematic intersection of politics, ecology and economics, where we all are the cause of our planet's deterioration as well as the ineffective harbinger of a possible solution. In Jonathan Durham's work, elements of personal history and cultural legacy are conjoined in an ongoing examination of the definition of self as an individual, culture or society in relationship to the world at large. Hana Hillerova seeks to reconcile inner and outer life in sculptures whose surfaces and structures are open and absorptive to the outside world, but at the same time offer a contained place for quiet contemplation. Hedwige Jacobs's drawings and animations pull the viewer into a world full of lived experiences. Charting life in all its mundane twists and turns, the drawings offer a visual stream of consciousness without beginning or end.
Andres Janacua proposes a "new colonial theory." In revisiting, redefining and recontextualizing monuments and symbols of modernity, he seeks to question and broaden our common notions and understandings of history. Nicholas Kersulis's painted discs and stones confound the definitions of painting and sculpture, raising questions about representation while seeking truth in both nature and culture. Mindy Kober's series of gouaches translates the symbolic imagery representing each of the fifty states on the backs of American quarters into luscious compositions spiked with her own witty and subversive political commentary.
Jonathan Leach's paintings of cityscapes are deeply influenced by the different dynamics of the places he inhabits. Working from memory, he captures their unique appeal and energy in vibrant compositions that relay the essence of his experience of specific locations. In creating the appearance of having employed children to build a wall in the gallery space, Lynne McCabe's project examines the delicate balance between social integration and artistic exploitation in current modes of community-oriented practices. Ariane Roesch examines the quality of communication in the digital age. Her work stages the exchange of information in the workplace as circuit drawings among connected yet ultimately isolated individuals.
Julie Spielman's practice investigates the construction of personal histories as they relate to people's cultural contexts. Through conversation, film and photography, she examines the trajectory of inherited and chosen influences in the lives of friends and family. Born in Kenya to a Polish father and an English mother, Gabriela Trzebinski has dealt with issues of culture, race and gender since early childhood. In paintings of death, mutilation, sex and political injustice, she lays bare the harsh realities of her multicultural experience on the African continent.
Jeff Williams draws attention to what lies beneath the fabric of our daily lives. In exposing the foundations of our existence, he encourages a more responsible stance toward our built environment and our conditioning of it. Audry Worster creates abstract landscapes and cityscapes whose densely layered combination of biomorphic and crystalline shapes lay bare the struggle of giving tangible shape to the fleeting images of memory.
Charles "Teenie" Harris: Rhapsody in Black and White May 10 - August 2, 2008
Rhapsody in Black and White is part of a collaborative project between Blaffer, the Cynthia Woods Mitchell Center for the Arts, DiverseWorks, and the Society for the Performing Arts (SPA). Co-curated by world-renowned choreographer Ronald K. Brown and leading photographic arts expert Deborah Willis, it features the work of African-American photojournalist Charles "Teenie" Harris, who worked at the Pittsburgh Courier from 1936 to 1975.
The exhibition is organized in conjunction with Brown's major new choreographic work, One Shot, which will be presented by DiverseWorks and SPA at downtown's Wortham Theatre Center on Saturday, May 10. One Shot was inspired by "Teenie" Harris's photographs, housed at the Carnegie Museum of Art, which encompass the world's largest image archive of African-American life. Leading up to the exhibition and performance, Brown will conduct teaching residencies at the University of Houston and will work with elementary school children in the Third Ward at Project Row Houses' after-school program.
Charles “Teenie” Harris: Rhapsody in Black and White is presented by the Cynthia Woods Mitchell Center for the Arts at the University of Houston. This exhibition is part of a city-wide collaboration with DiverseWorks and Society for the Performing Arts, with additional partners, Project Row Houses and Blaffer Gallery, the Art Museum of the University of Houston. The exhibition is made possible through the generous support of the Alcoa Foundation. The images on view in the exhibition are from the Charles “Teenie” Harris Archive of Carnegie Museum of Art, Pittsburgh. The exhibition is organized by August Wilson Center for African American Culture with the help of Carnegie Museum of Art, Pittsburgh and PMG Arts Management.
