Fieldwork Marfa, May 2024.
This past May I drove to Marfa to study art theory with Abinadi Meza and my fellow graduate students for two weeks.
This trip to West Texas would be different from my previous two- or three-night stays. With two weeks, I had time to settle, wander, and reflect.
Read MoreThe fall was spent with wood fabrication and getting settled in my new studio space (see previous post). In the spring, I followed through with some of the experiments I had begun in the later part of the fall semester. I also took my first two college credit art history courses.
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Completed sofa for my studio at The University of Houston
This past fall I took to wood fabrication and sought a project that would make me feel more comfortable working with power tools and three dimensionally. Having recently moved into my studio at The University of Houston, I quickly learned that a sofa was an essential piece of studio furniture. So, building a sofa became my first project.
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John Guzman: Flesh and Bone at Blaffer Art Museum
It is Wednesday, September 20th, 2023, and Houston is in the midst of an exciting exhibition season. I am taking a moment to pause, because the flood of events, exhibitions, and artworks is starting to become a blur. Having just resurfaced after the city’s second worst summer in recent history (2011 being the first), my head is scrambling to make sense of everything I’ve seen.
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I moved into Elgin Street Studios and made a proper nest of my studio in late August. Book shelves installed, flat files purged, and artwork organized.
It was bewildering to see everything I’ve been working on in a single room again. For the past year, my studio has been divided between a one bedroom apartment and a very full storage unit. Unfinished thoughts and loose threads ran rampant.
There is work to be done. My first set of critiques this week made that evident. I look forward to sharing what comes of all this in the months and years ahead.
Earlier this year Open MFA welcomed me back for their collaborative exhibition Supported/Suspended at Box13 Artspace.
Organized by Hillaree Hamblin and Amanda Powers, the exhibition was an experimental approach to group curation. Inspired by the work of Jennifer Moss and Marie Watt, Open MFA’s Supported/Suspended offered its artists the opportunity to construct and respond to the metaphorical and literal prompt of support and suspension. Artists contributed individual works, created new work, and collaborated on the exhibition’s overall form.
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Detail of Luis Camnitzer’s Arbitrary Order (2023) at Alexander Gray Associates
I visited several shows in New York this past week, but I have decided to focus on only two as they share similar themes with my own work: Signs of Life at Templon Gallery and Arbitrary Order at Alexander Gray Associates.
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BLOCK XXII Exhibition opens Thursday, September 8th
For the past two years, I have had the pleasure of studying art and receiving professional feedback from guest artists and curators with the BLOCK Program at the Glassell Studio School at the Museum of Fine Arts, Houston. Founded in 2014, BLOCK is an intense one to two-year program (artists re-apply for a second year) made up of 12 artists, including myself, and two mentors – Laura August and Francesca Fuchs.
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Rendering of the pop-up truck camper to host the Here & There Residency
Starting June 18th, I will embark on a new project titled the Here & There Residency (HTR). Taking place in a pop-up truck camper, this 3-6 month residency facilitates travel to remote locations, living nomadically, and engaging with the outdoors.
While traveling across the United States, I will investigate place, time, and movement in relation to physical reality and the digital present. This practice is in part a response to the pandemic and the looming encroachment of digital technology on everyday life.
In residence, I will host a Substack that will feature my written responses to physical place and logistics of the residency. Please consider purchasing a subscription to support this work.
Installation view. Image: Amanda Powers.
Gathering What’s Tangible opened earlier this month at Flatland Gallery in Houston, Texas. I am incredibly excited about this group show, because it is my first exhibition as curator. Swimming in new waters, I was excited and nervous but kept it together despite getting sick one week prior.
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Women & Their Work invited me to “Fresh from the Studio”. I presented my work alongside artists Maria Cristina Jadick and Cristina White-Jones.
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Memories at a Distance, 2021
Unlike an art book, catalog or monograph that tend to showcase artworks created in another medium, the term ‘artists’ books’ refers to publications that have been conceived as artworks in their own right.
This is an ongoing, living list of resources for artists’ books. Please comment with any suggestions or additions.
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Exhibition poster design by Amanda Powers
I joined the artist collective Open MFA in fall 2019. We–Amanda, Hillaree, Ryan, and I–hosted social events, organized artist talks, and planned a collaborative group show for 2020. Then the pandemic hit. We tried planning a few virtual events, but those quietly subsided as Zoom burn out took over. Open MFA went on a hiatus.
In January 2022, nearly two years later, Open MFA relaunched. We planned our first meet-up for February and brainstormed ideas for the new year. By March, we hosted our first group show at Raven Tower.
Read MoreThese are the exhibitions and artworks I will remember from 2021. I start with a bit of writing and then trail off with a list.
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After an exciting year in the studio and awkward year on Zoom, I am proud to share BLOCK XXI’s group exhibition. The exhibition features work by the 12 artists of BLOCK XXI and is on view at the Glassell School of Art through December 3, 2021.
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Studio image (August 31, 2021)
This is the second post regarding the project “From the Cave”. When I received word of the project’s approval, I began researching the ideas and themes associated with it further.
To read about the planning stage, please visit the first post.
Read MoreFrom the Cave, September 3, 2021, photographed by Erica Lee.
I recently completed “From the Cave” - my first artwork intended for a larger public and funded by a grant. It was an installation and an online performance - two categories that were also new to me.
The grant application was surprisingly helpful to the project as it encouraged me to be specific. I went from having a vague idea of what I wanted to do, to having a very clear vision. The deadline also helped me push through moments of indecision.
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From the Cave is the number three art pick in the Chron’s Preview section.
From the Cave was selected as one of the “four fine-arts events you need to see this week” by The Houston Chronicle.
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View of the Blue Ridge Mountains from the Penland School of Craft
Late this summer I attended a papermaking workshop at the Penland School of Craft – a scenic community outside of Asheville in the Blue Ridge Mountains of North Carolina.
The whole experience felt incredibly romantic. Each day, I woke up, walked to breakfast, met artists interested in all sorts of craft arts (basket weaving, sand casting, woodworking), hiked around campus as fog cleared, and learned about papermaking from some of the most experienced and enthusiastic teachers I have ever met.
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Front cover of Two Months, Two Years
I made this book in November 2020 - eight months into the pandemic. I wanted something to help me track the progression of time and place myself as Covid-19 persisted. Made up of 62 pages, each day of December 2020 and January 2021 is given a single page.
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