UP CLOSE

Houston Loves Eccentrics by Bill Arning

Production still from Trenton Doyle Hancock,Stephen Mills, and Graham Reynolds's ballet Cult of Color: Call to Color, 2008. Courtesy James Cohan Gallery, , and Ballet Austin. Photo Tony Spielberg.

Robert Rauschenberg I arrived in in 2009 to direct the political realities-especially around guns Contemporary Arts Museum and reproductive rights-there is broad Foundation I after a lifetime on the East Coast, and the bipartisan support for the arts. Even the Art in America first lesson I learned was that Houston conservative community brags about the Arts Writing Fellowship loves eccentrics. It is, in fact, something of city's openness to controversial art. a tradition and likely why I have been able I was unaware when I moved here Essay to thrive as a museum director here. that Texans consider the state its own I've found Houston to be a progres­ country, and that I would need to study sive and intellectual city-a bright blue its history-most of my fellows had dot in a massive field of red. We have had already learned it in junior high school. This article is part of the Robert an arts-friendly, out-lesbian mayor for the Several books on the history ofTexas art Rauschenberg Foundation I Art in last six years. There are more artists' talks, would be required reading as well.1 It's no America Arts Writing Fellowships, a joint project designed to foster lectures, performances, film screenings, surprise, then, that the cultural landscape art and culture writing in cities and concerts than one could ever attend. here is full of world-class attractions. Yet throughout the U.S. This makes it easy to forget the regres­ Houston is a cat city, rather than a dog sive elements of the political machine city, meaning that its charms can make BILL ARNING is director of the Contemporary Arts Museum Houston. working against equality and sanity in themselves scarce and do not come to See Contributors page. the state. But despite the truly heinous you just because you express a passing

70 MAY 2016 curiosity. The city requires a tour guide and emulate it in their own patronage. and a car. I hope this essay will serve as The Menils were involved in the found­ an introduction to a city that I find to be ing period of the Contemporary Arrs richer in artistic stimulation every year. Museum Houston (1948), constructed The double meaning of"rich" is the Rothko Chapel (1971), and helped intended, for the response T-shirt to the the Museum of Fine Arts, Houston, ubiquitous is grow exponentially,before building the world-renowned Menil Collection, which "KEEP For AUSTIN someone WEIRD" whose "KEEP job opened in 1987. descriptionHOUSTON RICH." includes convincing wealthy Texans that supporting museums is a Add to these four institutions the worthy and enjoyable philanthropic 's Blaffer Art endeavor, a rich Houston is very welcome Museum, with its robust curatorial vision, and the city is well served by its museums, indeed. Most cities have a diversified Melanie Smith: Aztec Stadium. Malleable Deed, funding base. Houston money all comes which have divided the contemporary art 2010, video, 10 minutes, 29 seconds, back to the oil and gas industry-directly nu-£ We museum directors consistently In collaboration with Rafael Ortega. Courtesy Slcardi Gallery, Houston. or indirectly. Most general economic cooperate to ensure mat most major areas downturns are barely felt here due to the of investigation in contemporary art are consistent cash flow of the petroleum on view in Houston within a year of their business, as people keep driving their appearance in big art centers like New cars even when economically stressed. York, Los Angeles, London, or Berlin. Cultural leaders in the city all have the As a gateway city to South and price per barrel of oil in our morning Central America, and with the Museum news feeds, since it is the biggest single of Fine Arts devoting significant resources factor affecting the success of requests to its Latin American program, Houston Dario Robleto: gets current art fromthe south quickly. Harvest/Harvest for support of important projects. Even Moon (detail), during the 2016 sinkhole, there is money Under the leadership of .Mari 2014-15, �- being made, but few capital campaigns Carmen Ramirez, the MFAH's Latin cyanotypes of various moons in will be launched until the market condi­ American department has created a solid the solar system, tions change again. system for exhibiting and sometimes crystals, paper, feathers. and almost Cu1111ni011ent to access to the arts buying Latin American works, and mixed mediums, is a beautiful thing to see in the city. all me best collections in Houston have 30 by 69 by 16 made significant acquisitions. In 2015, inches overall. When artist and musician Robert Hodge Courtesy Inman released a hip-hop single with Phillip me Texas Contemporary Art Fair, held Gallery, Houston. Pyle II in 2014-the Black Guys'"The in the fall, mounted a survey of Mexico Menil Song" is about Hodge's discovery City galleries, leading many Houston as a black teen of the always-free, heavily collectors to prioritize Mexico City art air-conditioned galleries at the Menil-it fairs Zona Maco and Material Art Fair became an underground hit, giving me a over New York's Armory this year. Maria prideful thrill. Hodge-who had a killer Ines Sicardi started representing the show at CAMH of his paintings that mix great Latin American modernists, such hip-hop phrases, slavery-era illustra­ as Carlos Cruz-Diez and Luis Tomasello, tions, and images frompopajar culture and politically engaged conceprualists, and European art history2�cknow1- such as Liliana Porter and Miguel Angel edges that, for many in his community, Rios, well before mere was any market for museum-going is not part of life. But their works in North America. Sicardi has when he and his friends learned about also fostered the intricate, poetic practices Houston's free museums, they felt wel­ of Mexico City's Gabriel de la Mora and come and were happy to see tl1eir cultural Melanie Smith, bom of whom have pieces histories represented on the walls. in Houston collections. Performance is huge here, and there Relocating to Houston in 1941-when aremany festivals, such as the feisty Lone the city could rightly be termed provin­ Star Explosion and the classic Dance Salad. cial-John and Dominique de Menil Lone Star's lasr iteration remains infamous changed the terrain of cultural philan­ for the extremityof many of its presenta­ Robert Hodge: Why You All in My Grill?. thropy, and to this day Houston's phi­ tions,which had one major foundation 2014, MDF and mixed mediums on lanthropists hold the Menil model dear representativeasking me if we should climb reclaimed paper, 31 by 42 inches.

ART IN AMERICA 71 into the performance :ueai�.:e me! the Even though Houston has all this exciting performer to stop chokinghim__

Earl Staley: Portal Series #19, 2015, acrylic on he imagined himself as another victim a fairly high quality of life. canvas, 29 by 63 inches. of police violence and staged his funeral For non-�atives,I have heard Houston service,with other artists delivering described as a "flypaper city."You come eulogies. This year,Autumn Knight, to take advantage of one of the scores of the only Houston artist in the Crysral culture-industry jobs or residency programs. Bridges Museum of American Art's 2014 Then, years pass while you avoid oppor­ national survey,"State of the Art," staged tunities in other cities because it would her worl<,WALL,consisting of sound, involve a drastic decline in your standard rituals, and actions that explore the Wail­ of living. In 2014, artist and curator Steven ing Wall in Jerusalem and the Galveston Evans, whose wall paintings of disco-song Seawall. At CAMH, black women sat in titles from the '80s were among the stars of a row between the artist and the audience "Macho Man,Tell It to My Heart: Col­ to represent the power of resilience in the lected by Julie Ault" (2013-14) at Artists face of trauma. Space in New York,was lured to Houston Music and art mix well and oftenin from the Pace Foundation in San Antonio Houston. The blues musician Lightnin' to assume the directorship of FotoFest, the Hopkins has a memorial bus stop not fur tnternational photo-based biennial. Some from Project Row Houses, the long­ long-established Houston artists, such as the running art organization and installation lyrical abstract painter David Aylsworth and space in the historically black Third Ward conceptual sculptor Joseph Havel, came for neighborhood. Mark Flood began making short stays that extended for decades. Staley art while still in the punk band Culture­ moved back, and other artists with inter­ cide. Mayo Thompson, whose drawings national careers choose to keep Houston were on view at Greene Naftali in New as their second home (Angelbert Metoyer, York in fall 2015, foundedthe conceptual Amsterdam; Tameka Norris, Berlin). Alika Herreshoff: The Passenger, 2015, psychedelic band Red Krayola here in Havel is also director of tl1e Museum of acrylic on canvas, 24 by 20 inches. Courtesy Cardoza Fine Art. Houston. 1966 with drummer Frederick Barthelme. Fine Arts Houston's Glassell School of Art Today, Indian Jewelry, a band in the and its well-respected Core Program, which psychedelic tradition, dominates the music offersresidencies forart and art criticism scene. In the 1990s, DJ Screw (Robert and has allowed many great artists,cura­ Earl Davis Jr.) invented a deejaying tors,and writers to spend substantial time technique in Houston in which sound is in Houston. Critics like Andy Campbell, radically slowed down. DJ Screw's phrase alreadyan art historian, came from Austin "chopped and screwed" is used in Houston for Core and soon after started publishing in diverse contexts-fromrecipes to poems insightfulart writing internationally. He also and paintings-showing that his brilliant made it his business to know the artists here invention (the Houston version of Brian well,and he deejays expertly under the name Eno's Oblique Strategies) can be employed Dandy Campbell. The Galveston Artist across disciplines. DJ Screw died young Residency,started by artist Eric Schnell in (in 2000),but rapper Bun B has claimed 2008 after Hurricane Ike ravaged Houston's his mantle. In outsider music,Jandek, the beach resort, provides more interaction with mysterious cult singer, will occasionally the broader art world. View of Autumn Knight's performance WALL at the Contemporary Arts Museum Houston, 2016. Photo appear in underground showcases or the Three internationally known artists Max Fields. lobby of the Menil Collection. who maintain their homes and studios

72 �fAY 2016 UP CLOSE 1ere, Trenton Doyle Hancock, Dario Flood has indeed createdhis O'\m Robleto, and Mark Flood, don't seem art world in his hometown, regularly :o have much in common. One thing hosting visiting dealers, .and :hat links them is their eccentricity, their collectors in his Houston Heigh� srudio; :letermination to encounter the art world he frequentlyshows them works by :m exactly their own terms. (AJlthree young painters in the city. His support aave had or are going to have shows at has allowed many emerging talents, like CAMH.3) Robleto's studio is famously the abstractionists Lane Hagood,Jeremy :>ff-limits,even to his friends, family DePrez, Bret Shirley, and Alika Herre­ members, and dealers. He once described shoff,to exhibit at significant galleriesin h.is ideal studio as a version of the Bat New York and London while living here. Cave, where he drives in and the rocks Many of these emerging artis�are dose behind him. Such a situation is all affiliatedwith CardCYta Fine Art, in the the better to make his alchemical magic, Warehouse District, where Flood shows. in which long-lost sounds are trans­ The gallery, which has professionalized formed into deliciously poetic objects. recently due to the intense art world inter­ Hancock's studio on the northern est in its stable, has started hitting the art edge of the city is more sociable. Going fair circuit, debuting in 2015 at Texas Con­ there means entering the artist's deliri­ temporary and Miami Project Similarly, David McGee: MoFo, 2013, ous headspace, which is full of signature Hello Project, having opened as a wacky watercolor, tempera, and pencil on characters like the evil Vegan King, parasite space-a perfect white box one paper, 30 by 22 inches. Courtesy Texas Gallery, Houston. determined to rid tl1e world of the joy entered through the old-schoolHouston l provided by the Color Babies. His toy gallery McMurtrey-iscurrent y looking collection dominates the huge space and for another location but continues to pres­ probably inspired his own toy designs. ent artists like Hagoodand Travis Boyer at This seems fitting for an artist whose art fairs. Keeping up with the dozen or so alter ego, Torpedo Boy, is a cartoon new, bare-bones spaces that have opened character he created as a child. For Cult (Nicole Longnecker Gallery, ZoyaTommy oJColo1·:Call to Color (2008), he worked Gallery, Scott Charmin Gallery, Box 13, with Ballet Austin to transform his

art world as singer Christeene, the actor lery. Betty :;\loodyh� devoted the last Debra Barrera: Mount Pavlo(, 2014, Paul Soileau, from Austin's Rude Mechs forty yea.rs: of her lifem the artists of this 2015, graphite on paper, 18Y, by 2614 region and will explain their eccentric inches. Courtesy Moody Gallery, troupe, plays a collector in the movie Houston. whose art holdings need to be surgically backstories. he relli irresistible tales of removed from his ass. how artbts like TerryAllen.James Drake,

UP CLOSE ART IN AMERICA 73 and Gael Stack (all with lo careers) as In , the leafiest area well as nature-focused P !!l: Kempner, of a city not known forits natural beauty, quirkyMary McCleary, andel there are funkier galleries. Gspot is run Randy Twaddle establi hed themsekes in by a true Houston art eccentric named the state. When she brin in a�uunger WayneGilbert, who is an artist himself artist, like Debra Barrera or '.\lichael His own work takes the formof painted Bise-both of whom have embraced meditations on human individuality a masterfuldrawing technique to \'ery and mortality, made with pigments that disquieting ends-everyone takes notice. he mixes with unclaimed human ashes On Main Street in midtown one can fromfuneral homes. His roster of artists find Isabella Court, the ciry' central gal­ is similarly idiosyncratic. In April 2015, lery complex, with Devin Borden Gallery, Thedra Cullar-Ledfordpresented a wildly Art Palace, Samara Galleryand Inman humorous, angry, politically informative Gallery. David Shelton (formerlyon Isa­ exhibition about her recent mastectomy, WIITHCl;,tTMI ..;...:;::::r:-..::....- bella Court) and Art Palace relocated from offering a feminist response' to the male San Antonio and Austin, respectively, for medical establishment telling her how the greater playing fieldof confident,self­ one is supposed to feel regarding one's Nick Vaughan and Jake Margolin: South Central U.S.: directed collectors in Houston, and will cancerous breast tissue and one's body Pinups, 2014, acrylic on hand-cut found road map, 30 by 35 inches. Courtesy Devin Borden Gallery, Houston. mix global players like Keith Mayerson in after surgery. She had a giant pifiata with the regional emerging artists. David being beaten by women who have refused Shelton foundlarger digs in the 4411 reconstructive surgery that exploded with Montrose Building in January, and opened stickers that read "FUCK CANCER." with a killer show by New Yorker Mat­ New Orleans is Houston's nearest big­ thew Craven. Inman not only represents city neighbor to the east, and it makes for well-known painters like Aylsworth,but a weird mirror image. Houston is future­ also the poetic photographer Amy Blake­ focused,while New Orleans is allabout more and political artist Jamal Cyrus, preservingthe past. The artists who choose View ofThedra Cullar-Ledford's 2015 whose work has been shown at museums to be based in Houston are plugged into performance at across the United States. art happenings globally but do not worry Gspot Contemporary Art Space, Houston. Devin Borden presents work by about cities like New York and Los Ange­ Photo Sandy Wilson. artists who have some Texas connection, les on a daily basis. Over the last decade, even if it is just having family in the state Houston has oftenbeen compared to Los or teaching here briefly.My personal Angeles during the mythic period in the favoritesinclude Laura Lark's paintings, late '60s when it began to manifest its own performances and ink-on-Tyvek drawings artistic identity,going through a period that engage with women's mediated fan­ of not caring what New Yorkers thought tasy lives, and the juicy paintings of Geoff about its homegrown genius art-makers. Hippenstiel, known for their deliriously Houston'spride and self-confidence, worked surfaces.Upcoming is a first com­ despite the free-fall in oil prices, are at a mercial gallery exhibition by the duo Nick high point today, so perhaps we are an art Vaughan and Jake Margolin, who traveled scene ready to welcome curious outsiders around the country investigating queer into our wondrous realm-yet totally on regional histories and gay marriage, and our own Texas terms. 0 foundthat Houston was such an inviting place they have stayed ( though they keep

a residence in Tulsa as well). Their "Cut 1. Karie Robinson Edwards's excellent Midcentury Map" works are labor-intensive tributes Modern Art in Texas (University of Texas Press, 2014) to the gay histories of many unlikely is but the most recent example and should be required reading foranyone interested in how vibrant art com­ locations around the country. The maps munities arise outside of art centers. focusedon Texas reveal the role Houston 2. "Robert Hodge: Destroy and Rebuild," organized by played forthe entire Gulf Coast region as senior curator Valerie Cassel Oliver, was at CAMH, Oct. 3, 2014-Jan.4, 2015. a gay center. ot only was Houston akin 3. Robleto had a show in 2001 before I arrived. to ew York or San Francisco in the scale Hancock's drawing retrospective, organized by Valerie David Aylsworth: Up With Which Below Can't of its AIDScrisis, but it also launched the Cassel Oliver,just finished a four-city tour. Flood is Compare With, 2015, oil on linen, 14 inches square. currently preparing his second large-scale museum Courtesy Inman Gallery, Houston. test case overturningsodomy laws nation­ exhibition-his first in Houston-at CAMH for ally( Lawrence v. Texas). April 2016.

UP CLOSE 74 MAY 2016