Greater Houston Weekly - Top Of The Week
Omar Vera’s Texas drawings quite lovely
By Virginia Billeaud Anderson
A calm has come over Lawndale Art Center. At least it seems that way since Big Show ended. The cool thing about Big Show is it allows any artist living within 100 miles of Houston to submit work for juried exhibition.
This year there were more than 1,000 pieces submitted, 60 artists were selected and $3,000 awarded. With collectors and gallery owners paying close attention, Big Show provides delicious exposure for emerging and under represented artists. Adding to the excitement is a boozy opening party with more than 1,000 attending.
So any exhibition that follows Big Show would naturally seem tame. “The Grand Tour, Texas,” an exhibition of drawings and sculpture by Omar Vera, currently on display at Lawndale, is tame and lovely. For inspiration Vera riffs from the notion of the European “grand tour,” a centuries old tradition requiring that one tour Rome, Florence and Paris in order to properly complete one’s education. But instead of going to Europe, Vera traveled to three hick Texas towns – Roma, Florence and Paris.
He entered each town with a sketching pad and an easel, sat on a stool and recorded, thus simulating the approach of artists on the grand tour. Vera’s charcoal and ink drawings and table size terracotta sculptures delineate, in realistic style, the architecture and monuments he discovered in three Texas places named for their European counterparts.
“As much as it was about making art,” said Vera, “it was having an excuse to go to these places I would never have visited. Being new to Texas, it was a great opportunity to see the state, not just Houston, Austin and Dallas.”
Small town locals don’t hesitate to check out a stranger. Upon deciding he was harmless, Florence citizens directed Vera to an abandoned schoolhouse. His charcoal drawing of it captures the building’s crumbling bricks and overgrown shrubbery. Without help from Roma locals the artist discovered the 1860s Noah Cox House, a brick ruin decorated with a second floor iron balcony. “Noah Cox House,” created in charcoal, replicates along with that balcony, background Border Patrol spotlights. This unexpected detail nails the site very near the Rio Grande.
Vera was sitting in Roma sunburned and dehydrated after a few hours of sketching when the bitch waddled past. “Engorged Bitch” is a beautifully executed charcoal and conte rendering of a large dog with sagging teats. How ironic that she looks quite a bit like the “Capitolene Wolf,” a 500 BC sculpture depicting the suckling of Romulus and Remus, Rome’s mythological founders.
Conceptually similar in its artistic exploration of place is Shannon Duncan’s installation “Re-Vision: A Visual Preservation of Houston’s Inner Loop.” Instead of going to the piney woods or the border, Duncan focuses on Houston’s 23 inner loop zip code areas for which she spent six months tracking city of Houston residential demolition permits and then photographing the sites.
Through 424 Polaroid shots of residences in various states of demolition, the installation investigates Houston’s inner city new construction frenzy. Though some of the houses were clearly unsalvageable, others were perfectly fine and architecturally significant which probably means they were destroyed for being insufficiently monumental and grand. It feels weird to see houses that were very familiar 25 years ago and have been replaced with fake castle architecture.
The installation includes demolition permit computer lists as well as a large zip code map. Moving to view is its component “Recovery Collage,” a wall mounted grouping of objects Duncan found on the demolition sites. A one-cent stamp postcard, cracked eyeglasses and an old prescription drug container are a few items that allow a partial glimpse into former inhabitants’ lives. There is a self-improvement list that a child pencil-scratched onto a sheet of spiral notebook paper. Item 6 is listed as “hygiene,” item 9 as “devotions,” 12 “make money.” Item 14 is “practice talking to girls.”
Lawndale’s main gallery features the installation “Transcendental Smoothie” by Mary Magsamen and Stephan Hillerbrand. The second floor offers “What’s in a Line?” an exhibition by Judith Cottrell and Alex Lopez. All can be viewed through Sept. 27.
“The Grand Tour, Texas”
“The Grand Tour, Texas” is an exhibition of drawings and sculpture by Omar Vera, currently on display at the Lawndale Art Center. For inspiration Vera riffs from the notion of the European “grand tour,” a centuries old tradition requiring that one tour Rome, Florence and Paris in order to properly complete one’s education. But instead of going to Europe, Vera traveled to three small Texas towns – Roma, Florence and Paris. Visit www.lawndaleartcenter.com for more information.
This year there were more than 1,000 pieces submitted, 60 artists were selected and $3,000 awarded. With collectors and gallery owners paying close attention, Big Show provides delicious exposure for emerging and under represented artists. Adding to the excitement is a boozy opening party with more than 1,000 attending.
So any exhibition that follows Big Show would naturally seem tame. “The Grand Tour, Texas,” an exhibition of drawings and sculpture by Omar Vera, currently on display at Lawndale, is tame and lovely. For inspiration Vera riffs from the notion of the European “grand tour,” a centuries old tradition requiring that one tour Rome, Florence and Paris in order to properly complete one’s education. But instead of going to Europe, Vera traveled to three hick Texas towns – Roma, Florence and Paris.
He entered each town with a sketching pad and an easel, sat on a stool and recorded, thus simulating the approach of artists on the grand tour. Vera’s charcoal and ink drawings and table size terracotta sculptures delineate, in realistic style, the architecture and monuments he discovered in three Texas places named for their European counterparts.
“As much as it was about making art,” said Vera, “it was having an excuse to go to these places I would never have visited. Being new to Texas, it was a great opportunity to see the state, not just Houston, Austin and Dallas.”
Small town locals don’t hesitate to check out a stranger. Upon deciding he was harmless, Florence citizens directed Vera to an abandoned schoolhouse. His charcoal drawing of it captures the building’s crumbling bricks and overgrown shrubbery. Without help from Roma locals the artist discovered the 1860s Noah Cox House, a brick ruin decorated with a second floor iron balcony. “Noah Cox House,” created in charcoal, replicates along with that balcony, background Border Patrol spotlights. This unexpected detail nails the site very near the Rio Grande.
Vera was sitting in Roma sunburned and dehydrated after a few hours of sketching when the bitch waddled past. “Engorged Bitch” is a beautifully executed charcoal and conte rendering of a large dog with sagging teats. How ironic that she looks quite a bit like the “Capitolene Wolf,” a 500 BC sculpture depicting the suckling of Romulus and Remus, Rome’s mythological founders.
Conceptually similar in its artistic exploration of place is Shannon Duncan’s installation “Re-Vision: A Visual Preservation of Houston’s Inner Loop.” Instead of going to the piney woods or the border, Duncan focuses on Houston’s 23 inner loop zip code areas for which she spent six months tracking city of Houston residential demolition permits and then photographing the sites.
Through 424 Polaroid shots of residences in various states of demolition, the installation investigates Houston’s inner city new construction frenzy. Though some of the houses were clearly unsalvageable, others were perfectly fine and architecturally significant which probably means they were destroyed for being insufficiently monumental and grand. It feels weird to see houses that were very familiar 25 years ago and have been replaced with fake castle architecture.
The installation includes demolition permit computer lists as well as a large zip code map. Moving to view is its component “Recovery Collage,” a wall mounted grouping of objects Duncan found on the demolition sites. A one-cent stamp postcard, cracked eyeglasses and an old prescription drug container are a few items that allow a partial glimpse into former inhabitants’ lives. There is a self-improvement list that a child pencil-scratched onto a sheet of spiral notebook paper. Item 6 is listed as “hygiene,” item 9 as “devotions,” 12 “make money.” Item 14 is “practice talking to girls.”
Lawndale’s main gallery features the installation “Transcendental Smoothie” by Mary Magsamen and Stephan Hillerbrand. The second floor offers “What’s in a Line?” an exhibition by Judith Cottrell and Alex Lopez. All can be viewed through Sept. 27.
“The Grand Tour, Texas”
“The Grand Tour, Texas” is an exhibition of drawings and sculpture by Omar Vera, currently on display at the Lawndale Art Center. For inspiration Vera riffs from the notion of the European “grand tour,” a centuries old tradition requiring that one tour Rome, Florence and Paris in order to properly complete one’s education. But instead of going to Europe, Vera traveled to three small Texas towns – Roma, Florence and Paris. Visit www.lawndaleartcenter.com for more information.
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