12 Cite Fall 1986 Remember Houston Stephen Fox 5

Houston has not proved fertile ground for Washington, D.C. sculptor, Louis monuments. Remembering - the activity Amateis. to execute the first monumental ^riJi'->*&*» thai monuments stimulate - is apparently work of Civic Art erected in Texas, the too unprofitable to occasion much Texas Heroes Monument at Broadway enthusiasm locally for their erection. and Rosenberg i n Gal vc ston (1896-1900). There are other problems too: a limited In the American Renaissance tradition, • conception of what merits recollection Amateis combined heroic bronze figures and, most critically, the lack of any and bronze relief tablets depicting Texas conventional forms of conduct for historical scenes in a classically detailed experiencing those monuments that have architectural composition. The Texas been erected. Therefore, it is hardly Heroes Monument remains the pre- surprising that naming parks, streets, and eminent work of Civic Art in the state, Texas Heroes Monument, Galveston, 1900, Louis Amateis, sculptor, J.F. Manning and Co buildings containing public institutions and it immediately inspired Houstonians, after outstanding citizens or notable just then beginning to assess critically the events has come to seem a more efficient quality of the local environment, to took York sculptor John Angel, which was commissioned artists to embellish extant means of commemoration than "useless" beyond Frank Teich. installed on the Rice Institute campus in public buildings. The Section of Fine Arts monuments.' 1930. The standard of artistic production of the Public Buildings Administration It was also to Louis Amateis that the that these monuments represented was commissioned artists to provide work for To some extent these shortcomings stem Houston chapter of the United Daughters consistently high. But only the Sam new federal government buildings. New from the fact that only twice in Houston's of the Confederacy turned to produce Houston and Founder's monuments can construction projects funded by the Public history have there been concerted efforts Houston's initial work of Civic Art, The be considered major works; and they were Works Administration provided for the to make monuments. Both episodes Spirit of the Confederacy (1906-1908). all that Houstonians managed to erect inclusion of commissioned art work. occurred during the first half of the 20th The Spirit, a mawkishly conceived but during the great boom of the 1920s. century: the Civic Art movement of the competently executed allegorical piece, In the first category, the best-known local Progressive Era, and the Public Art was set up in Sam Houston Park rather At the end of the 1920s there was a art works were the murals painted in 1935 movement of the New Deal. Both than at the intersection of the two widest resurgence of interest in Texas historical in the Julia Ideson Building of the allied artistic production with streets in town as was done with the Texas themes that continued through the 1930s. Houston Public Library by three Houston commemoration, resulting in styles Heroes Monument. Thus it has always The architect Kenneth Franzheim retained artists, Emma Richardson Cherry, Angela of representation that are easily been geographically remote, and today it a New York decorative painter, Vincent McDonnell, and Ruth Pershing Uhler. recognizable. Both also survived as is most often seen at a distance from Maragliatti, to produce eight murals Uhler's immortal The First Subscription styles of representation in Houston well outbound cars on Lamar Avenue. depicting Texas historical scenes in the Committee, 1854, at the first-floor beyond what is usually considered their lobby of the Guir Building (1929), landing of the main stair, is a resourceful historical terms. Yet, with few exceptions, In contrast, Houston's most recognizable designed by Franzheim and Alfred C. adjustment to an awkward site (a wall the monuments that were built exist in that public monument is centrally located and Finn. Twice more during the 1930s containing a window). The theme also peculiar state of suspended animation that highly visible: the bronze equestrian out-of-town artists were commissioned by was unusual for its specificity: an event seems to pervade everything in Houston statue of Sam Houston, set up at the corporate clients to execute public murals pertaining to the history of the public connected with the past. By and large entrance to Hermann Park in 1925 and representing Texas historical scenes: John library that occurred in a house which these artifacts lack resonance. modeled by the Italian-bom and trained A. McQuarrie of San Francisco for the originally occupied the site of the library Disconnected from the life around them, Houston sculptor, Enrico F. Cerracchio. Southern Pacific Lines at the now- building. In the second category, the they become - perversely - tokens of the The Sam Houston Monument successfully demolished Grand Central Station (1934), young Houston sculptor, William M. collective amnesia that alienates fulfills conventional expectations about and Eugene Montgomery of Chicago for McVey, executed two relief panels in the Houstonians from their city, and keeps the role of monuments. Its visibility and Sears, Roebuck and Company's new store new Federal Office Building at Fannin them from feeling themselves part of a accessibility are important factors, as is at Main Street and Wheeler Avenue and Franklin (1941), and the two most community. its specificity. It is a monument to a man (1939). Of far less consequence was the celebrated young artists in Texas, Jerry (Sam Houston), an event (the Texas insignificant Pioneer's Memorial Shaft, By waters and A lexandre Hogue of Dal las. The earliest monuments in Texas tended victory at San Jacinto toward which, it is erected in Hermann Park in 1936 to painted two murals each on the theme of to be monuments first, and works of art said, the Figure's extended arm is commemorate the centennial of Houston - the Houston Ship Channel for the by courtesy. Not inappropriately, pointed), and a place and its history (the a reversion to the graveyard standard of now-demolished Parcel Post Annex graveyard art accurately describes the City of Houston, named forSam Houston earlier years. Building (1941), In the third category, the style of representation with which these and designated under his aegis provisional architect Joseph Finger retained Daniel monuments acquired form. The first capital of the Republic of Texas). The By the middle 1930s, however, such MacMorris, a Kansas City decorative public monument that can be accounted monument connects viewers to a series of private works of public art began to be painter, to execute the heavy-handed for in Harris County is the obelisk experiences that account for the existence amplified by the unprecedented expansion plaster reliefs in the foyer of the new City erected in 1881 above the grave of of the city. of the U.S. government into the field of Halt (1940). Finger also retained the Benjamin Rice Brigham (one of the two art patronage. Both sculptors and Beaumont sculptor Herring Coe, assisted Texans killed during the Battle of San Cerracchio's Sam Houston was the major painters, almost all of them Texans and by Raoul Josset, to produce the much Jacinto) at the battle site. Were it not for more satisfying relief panels that ring the work of Civic Art erected during the many of them Houstonians, were retained 2 patriotic inscriptions and a listing of 1920s. It represented a tendency current between 1934 and 1941 to produce exterior of the City Hall. other Texas victims of the battle, the in Houston during the *20s to memorialize monumental works of art in public Brigham Monument (designed and individuals with art monuments, although buildings. The themes represented The single greatest monument erected in constructed by the Galveston marble most of these were privately included the by-now-familiar lineup of Texas also was a beneficiary of PWA cutting firm of A. Allen and Company) commissioned. An early example was the personages and events connected with the financing, the 570-foot-high San Jacinto would be indistinguishable from funeral bronze relief plaque of James L. Autry history of the Republic of Texas, as well Monument (1935-1938). designed by monuments typical of late 19th-century that Will C. Hogg had the Italian-born and as local historical events and vignettes of Alfred C. Finn. Built to commemorate the American cemeteries. The first public trained sculptor, Pompeo Coppini, contemporary life, the so-called American centennial of Texas's independence, the monument erected in Houston, the Dick execute in 1921 for installation at The Scene. Painting and sculpture remained monument consists of an obelisk crowned Dowling statue (i 905, originally instal led Autry House, 6265 Main Street. The figural (rather than abstract) in style and by a three-dimensional star, centered at Market Square, now located in estate of the developer Henry F. epic in character. But in place of the above a base containing a museum, and Hermann Park), was the work of a San MacGregor retained the New York academic conventions of Civic Art surrounded by broad, raised terraces. A Antonio stone contractor, Frank C. Teich, sculptor Gutzon Borglum to model a classicism, a new. more aggressive 1,750-foot-long reflecting basin provides whose stock-in-trade was graveyard bronze relief of a female figure set on a realism was preferred. This "regional" a dramatic horizontal counterpoint to the memorials. This field of specialization stone backing as part of a fountain style exchanged the nymphs and muses of shaft's vertical thrust. William M, McVey apparently was considered sufficient constructed at Peggy's Park on Almeda the academy for new. down-to-earth was responsible for executing the qualification, for Teich exercised a virtual Road (1927) in honor of Peggy Stevens idealizations: the common man and the crowning star, the bronze entrance doors, monopoly on the production of public MacGregor, MacGregor's widow. (The common woman, who, moreover, were and the band of reliefs that encircles the monuments in Texas at the beginning of sculpture, minus the fountain, now sits not always Caucasian. base of the shaft. the 20th century. opposite Peggy's Point Park at Richmond and Main.) Grandest of all was the Public art patronage was dispensed Yet its size, material splendor, and Rather than commission such pedestrian heroically scaled, seated bronze figure through several programs. The best- considerable formal presence work, the trustees of Henry Rosenberg's of William M. Rice as The Founder, the known was the Public Works Art Project notwithstanding, the San Jacinto estate engaged the Italian-born and trained work of the English-bom and trained New of the Civil Works Administration, which Monument shares in the condition of Cite Fall 1986 13

wny, architect San Jacinto Monument, 1938, Alfred C. Finn, architect, William M. McVey, sculptor

marginality thai afflicts other Houston Ironically, the bank did attract national monuments. In part it is because the attention when, for fear of community if monument is located in an industrial reaction, it rejected a colossal, bare- *•?"* ,-^t--- 11 corridor along the Houston Ship Channel breasted female Figure symbolizing Texas rather than in the center of Houston. But "rising out of struggle and war" that was H- its extreme hieratic demeanor seems part of a larger relief by William Zorach, misplaced for other than geographical The New State of Texas, intended for the 9 reasons. In its formal and rhetorical main entrance bay on Travis. over-determination, the San Jacinto Monument implies a ritualized conduct of Under such circumstances it is not iM public life so at variance with actual surprising that, with the exception of the practices that it is apt to be experienced Tamayo, the other Franzheim-related as merely a quaint, if not campy, period works were conservative. This was true V - piece. (In this regard, it is not unlike its also of Edward Z. Galea's relief panel on Dallas counterpart, the Texas Hall of State the Transcontinental Gas Pipe Line Area Code. 1962, Jim Love (b. 1927), at the Texas Centennial Exposition.) In its Company Building at Travis and Elgin Houston Ship Channel. Parcel Post Annex sculptor. Steel, cast iron, and lead, 8Alley Theatre, gift symbolizes the predicament of public the Holland Lodge at 4911 Montrose of the Brown Foundation, Houston, Texas) monuments in Houston: even though Boulevard (1954), and even John executed at large scale, it has no Biggers's mural. The Negro Woman in TT relationship to public life. It is acuriosity. American Life and Education, at the Blue Despite its visibility from the Ship Triangle YWCA at 3005 McGowan Channel and Interstate 10, the San Jacinto Avenue (1953). Monument has never impressed itself on public consciousness like the Statue of The transition from an epic. Figurative, Liberty, for instance, or the archetypal 3 thematically explicit style of art to one Texas monument, the Alamo. that was internalized, non-Figurative, and allusive rather than speciFic resulted in the The representational style embodied in virtual absence of attempts to erect public New Deal art continued to be employed monuments in the 1960s, although a piece in Houston for over a decade after the such as Jim Love's Area Code (1962), termination of public relief programs in displayed in the lobby of the Alley 1941. During the 1940s and 1950s Theater, demonstrates that it was possible patronage for monumental art once again to secure modernist works incorporating reverted to private benefaction. culturally resonant imagery suitable for Responsible for the greatest number of public installation. When large-scale significant commissions was the architect works of public art began to be installed Kenneth Franzheim, who time and again again in the 1970s they were rarely managed to persuade his clients to include intended to serve monumental purposes. sculpture and murals in new architectural Most tacked an iconographic program and projects. However, these began to shade displayed little interest in inspiring civic into the more generalized realm of public virtue or embodying collective memory. an: works of art displayed in public places Ironically for a city with such a Fitful but not intended to serve any tradition of public art, the quality of the commemorative purpose. pieces installed was exceptionally high. Yet when these art works were pressed The monumentally of Octavio Medellfn's into service as monuments, it was almost relief panel at Franzheim's Police always as monuments by implication, Administration, Jail and Municipal whether as a recollection of traditional Courts Building (1952). Peter Hurd's forms (Barnett Newman's Broken vast, American Scene genre piece The Obelisk, 1966, dedicated to the Rev. * Future Belongs to Those Who Prepare Martin Luther King, Jr.). or in the use of For It (1952) at Franzheim's Prudential indigenous materials (Michael Heizer's Building, 1100 Holcombe Boulevard, 45". 90°. 18(T. 1984, at Rice University), and, finest of all, Rufino Tamayo's or simply by the title (Mac Whitney's America (1956) in the banking hall of Houston, 1983, at Stude Park). Franzheim's Bank of the Southwest Building is diffuse. The First two were Several provocative attempts have been perhaps intended to be didactic; the third made to formulate iconographic styles was sufFiciently abstract and allegorical capable of broader publiccommunication. that Tamayo's subject was not Ironic archaism and an ingenious immediately discernible. This was synthesis of the values, sources of wealth, fortuitous, for his (heme - the mixture of and geographical and climatological the races inhabiting the American extremes of Houston inspired Christo's continent - quite likely would have stunning, but unexecuted, Houston elicited an excited response in race- Mastaba (1974), which was to have been The First Subscription Committee, 1854, Julia Ideson Building, Houston Public conscious Houston of the 1950s. (Continued on page 21) Library. 1935, Ruth Pershing Uhler, painter Cite Fall 1986 21 Remember Houston X (Continued from page 13)

Houston Mastaba, Project for 1,250,000 Vaquero, Moody Park, 1979, Luis Oil Drums. 1974, Christo, artist. Jimenez, sculptor Drawing-collage, pencil, crayons, colored crayons, enamel paint, photostat Manipulating witty, ironic imagery to and map, 3(rx22" (76 x 56 cm.) (Photo attract popular attention and developing by Eeva-Inkeri. courtesy of the artist) procedures for translating patterns of life into artifacts are two possible ways to constructed of 1,25 million oil drums. make the necessary connection between Luis limcruv and Richard Haas both the community and objects intended to deploy wit and irony in the public- memorialize it. It is clear (hat monuments, monuments they have executed in if they are to stimulate Houstonians into Houston. Jimenez's Vaquero (1979), at resisting amnesia and remembering their Moody Park, exploits lurid colors and city, must confront the public with itself, action-packed composition to impress make the city visible as a community, and itself on viewers; Haas's mural Houston inspire the forms of public life that will (1983), at Town and Country Mall, is perpetuate civic recognition and American Scene retro, updated with memory.* astronauts and traffic jams. Recent submissions to two design competitions - Notes that of Ben Nicholson to the Sesquicentennial Park Design 1 Thanks to Terrell Jameti and Drexe I Turner for i heir insightful critical observations. Competition, and that of Peter D. 2 Sadly, one of Houston's most gifted young artists, Waldman and Christopher Genik to the ihepairiiei and SL-ulptor Julian R Muench, was not "Transformations'' charrette sponsored by retained lo execute any public works of monumental Young Architects Forum at Diverse art locally. Works - although architectural in nature, J On the symbolic potency of the Alamo, see Susan Prendergast Schoelwer with Tom Closer, Alamo suggest new ways of imagining and Images. Changws Perceptions of a Texas s.iks fashion Cental imaging Houston that extract, reinterpret, Experience, Dallas: DeColyer Library and Southern moo t'osl Oak Boulevard. Houston and objectify local historical and cultural Methodist University Press, 1985. patterns. 713/627-7495 Romancing the Stone (Continued from page 15) sculptures themselves. At the other The decision lo create a self-reflective extreme, the banality of the tall, stock entity rather than use the site and program lighting fixtures is similarly disconcerting, Coffee Then to build upon salient features of the if less obtrusive. Except for special proximate built environment or regional events, the only provision made for And Now seating (apart from the grassy knolls) are patterns runs counter to present Coffee beans came West with the people austere, permanently placed concrete architectural tendencies. It is not hard to who settled Texas. Settlers roasted, benches resembling precast girders - a imagine a design that attempts to weave ground and brewed their coffee over measure of control that precludes the together the Glassell School, The campfires, and at open hearths. Hardy casual placement of individual chairs. Museum of Fine Arts, and the pioneers gave way to urban cowfolk, One element that escapes this syndrome Contemporary Arts Museum (Gunnar and fresh roasted coffee to grounds in a of either rigid conformity or indifference Birkerts, 1972) directly across Montrose. can. One wonders if even a modest effort to is the mot juste of the metal grate at the Then in 1973, the House of Coffee establish some spatial or material base of many of the trees, which looks Beans, Houston's original coffee store, relationship to context might have added marvelous and neither ostentatious nor was founded. Today you can come by some richness to the final realization. It unconsidered. In all, the avid if Houston's coffee pioneer for a is, however, ill-advised to make occasionally selective adherence to this fresh-roasted, fresh-brewed sample, and contextual relationships the sole criterion heavy reductionist palette docs more to discover something timeless. for evaluating a work of design. Once hinder the presentation of the sculpture faced with the intention to create an than aid it. Because the range of independent object, it must be considered constructed elements is so limited, there LIS such, knowing that the success of urban is no method of adjusting for objects of a HOUSE of ^OFFEE BEANS interventions of any sort derives largely smaller scale, as is apparent in the Houston's *s ooriginan l coffee store, since 1973. from intrinsic qualities that may influence awkwardness of the presentation of the subsequent development by example. Robert Graham pieces, and which might 2520 Sice Boulevard • in the Village • 524-0057 • 10-6 Monday -Saturday discourage further presentation of A more serious deficiency in this project intimate works. But on the whole, the lies in the realization of its internal works of art appear fairly comfortable, components, which are sometimes at perhaps because the collection is such a cross purposes with the intention of familiar gathering of works by all the creating a counter landscape. The use of expected artists that it may offer no real close-cropped St. Augustine grass to test of the space's flexibility. cover the bent planes and sensuous mounds of earth suggests a golf course The passage of lime will allow one to green that contrasts unfavorably with evaluate the degree of success or failure Noguchi's initial proposal to cover these of this counter landscape. The inherent surfaces with monkey grass, a less ruly problem of the whole strategy is that the We're big on small business and more giving material. The hyper- "world" here might be only a stage and articulation of each element in the garden perhaps an overly determined one at that, and the over-emphatic separation of alt despite the greater allure promised once materials used in construction from one the plants mature. One wonders, though, another is counter productive as well, if the Cullen Sculpture Garden's depriving the composition of a subdued, provocative, slightly surrealist edge might accepting fabric at appropriate points not also fade, and whether its continual along the way. The stone objects call for perceptual and psychological concealing numerous ground-level dislocation and awakening will endure. Patricia Sins Frederick lighting fixtures and even trash receptacles On these accounts there can be little BOOKKEEPING 5ERVICES prove ill-chosen subjects for certainty, for like all romances, its 2472 Bolsover • Suite 385 monumentalization and wind up crowding essence cannot be fully managed or even 522-1529 the garden so as to distract from the anticipated. •