Marilyn Crying Dyptic by Russell Young, 2011 (image courtesy the artist)

Russell Young Retrospective
Goss-Michael Foundation
March 7 through March 31, 2012

The Goss-Michael Foundation will premiere a retrospective exhibition by prominent British artist Russell Young. The exhibition will open to the public on March 7 and continue through March 31.

The Goss-Michael Foundation, a nonprofit organization, exists to educate, engage and inspire audiences by presenting exhibitions of British contemporary art, as well as provide vast resources, educational programs and scholarships to aspiring artists.

Earlier exhibitions have featured Tracey Emin, Damien Hirst, Tim Noble and Sue Webster, Sarah Lucas, Marc Quinn, Nigel Cooke and Michael Craig-Martin.

It was 20 years ago that Russell Young first lent his eye to celebrity culture. That assignment was photographing Foundation co-founder and music icon George Michael for the sleeve of the album Faith, which won the 1989 Grammy Award for Album of the Year and sold over 25 million copies worldwide.

That job launched a career and soon Young was shooting musicians like Morrissey, Bjork, Springsteen, Dylan, REM, New Order, The Smiths, Diana Ross, Paul Newman and many other celebrities. The next natural step was directing music videos; Russell directed a hundred music videos during the height of MTV.

Ten years into his career, Young started painting, but his work remained private until 2003, when Young showed his first series, and first sold-out show of paintings, called Pig Portraits, about the glamour in the dark side of crime, fame, sex, drugs, rock and roll.  On the heels of the first series came Fame + Shame, a visual celebration of the inevitable fallout of resulting chaos that comes from the three decades of cultural excess.

Dirty Pretty Things is one of the first diamond dust prints he produced and reflects Young’s love for light after growing up under the leaden skies of Northern England. One of the most famous images is his Marilyn Monroe in Living Well is the Best Revenge.

In 2010, Young endured an eight-day coma, pneumonia and ARDS: all induced by the H1N1 flu virus. He emerged from his near-death experience with severe memory loss and an incredibly weak body. During his long recovery he began to examine his life and his surroundings in a whole new way. Young left the hospital and had to learn to breath, write, draw, think and walk for the second time in his life.

Young came again to paint. This time, freed from the domestication of the “picture world” as a feral boy, his art was filled with a new, rough energy of violence, sex and power. With the Helter Skelter series, Young learned to dance with this energy, crossing into the subconscious.

“My work is sort of a soundtrack to my life, loves, experiences and influences and my method of working is to search, destroy and create. The images of this series have been collected from newspaper cuttings, eBay, and long correspondence with police departments throughout the world or even given by celebrities themselves. The idea to create ‘anti-celebrity’ portraits was probably a reaction to my former career,” said Young. “However, they turned out to be even more beautiful and iconic. There is undeniably this attitude that is very real, in your face, a beauty that is hard to ignore. My art is a sort of soundtrack to my life, loves, experiences and influences. These would be my heroes that are missing from art history.”

In addition to the images that will be seen in this retrospective, Young is also exposing his studio to the world through a 24-hour live webcam broadcast over the coming months. This performance piece will be streamed from his studio in California and can be viewed at www.russellyoung.com/cam.

Russell Young has risen to become one of the most collected and sought after artists of our time. Celebrities and the most discriminating collectors like Abby Rosen, the Gettys, Elizabeth Taylor, David Hockney, Brad Pitt, Angelina Jolie, David Bowie and President Barack Obama have added Young’s works to their collections. His larger than life screen print images from history and popular culture are compelling, daunting, and undeniable.

Young is married to actress Finola Hughes and they have three young children: Dylan, Cash and Sadie.   He lives and works in New York and California.

The GMF is pleased to present this exhibition which will highlight Young’s most famous works including a number of pieces mentioned above.

The Goss-Michael Foundation

The Goss-Michael Foundation was founded by George Michael and Kenny Goss in June 2007. The Foundation offers the public a rotating schedule of exhibitions derived from Goss and Michael’s private collection of British contemporary art as well as other institutions. These exhibitions serve as a challenge to preconceived art notions and strive to set a new standard in artistic awareness by providing visitors with fresh and fascinating art experiences. Through these experiences, the Foundation hopes to generate new perspectives and conversations on the creative methods of contemporary artists. Locally, the Foundation is dedicated to contributing to Dallas’ thriving artistic community and enhancing the public’s familiarity and interaction with contemporary and emerging British artists. The Foundation fosters young artists in Dallas, and throughout Texas through numerous scholarships and art education programs.

The Goss-Michael Foundation hours are Tuesday-Friday 10:00am-6:00pm, Saturday 11:00am-4:00pm, Monday by appointment only. There is no charge to visit the Foundation.

Marilyn Crying Dyptic by Russell Young, 2011 (image courtesy the artist)

Annie Lee: A Texas Farewell at Laura Moore Fine Art Studios

Annie Lee: A Texas Farewell
Laura Moore Fine Art Studios
February 11 through March 7, 2012

Laura Moore Fine Art Studios is excited to announce the 3rd exhibition with world-renowned artist Annie Lee.  Lee will be in attendance on opening night, Saturday, February 11, 2012, from 7-10 p.m., with the exhibition Annie Lee: A Texas Farewell featuring over 18 of her new acrylic paintings. The art in the exhibition focuses on everyday details from years gone by and solitary figures on the walk of life.

Lee’s often humorous, satirical style of painting has been termed Black Americana. She names Will Smith, Bill Cosby and Eddie Murphy as just a few of her notable collectors. Lee has been painting for over 60 years and with her first show in Chicago that sold out in 2 hours to single paintings selling for as much as $20,000, Lee is a true treasure in today’s art world. Lee has been living and painting in Texas for the last 6 years and now intends to return to Las Vegas where she once owned a 10,000 square foot art gallery.

“Mentor, art world navigator, savvy entrepreneur, advisor, humorist, neighbor and friend are just a few words that come to mind when I think of Annie,” Moore says. Moore states she has certainly enjoyed Lee’s time in North Texas and feels honored to know and to have painted alongside Lee.

The exhibition Annie Lee: A Texas Farewell is but a small outpouring of our well wishes towards Lee and her new endeavors. Come out on opening night and help give Lee a Texas sized sendoff. Annie Lee: A Texas Farewell opens on Saturday, February 11, 2012, from 7-10 p.m. at Laura Moore Fine Art Studios, 107 S Tennessee in historic downtown McKinney. The exhibition will be on display through March 7.

Gallery Hours are Monday through Saturday 1-5 p.m., 2nd Saturday 1-10 p.m., or by appointment. Free admission. 214.914.3630. www.lauramooreart.com

Art to Heart, works by Artists’ Showplace gallery owners that celebrate Valentine’s Day, will be featured in the gallery’s February exhibition.  The show runs February 3-25, with an opening reception on Friday, February 10, from 6 to 9 p.m. that is free to the public, with wine and hors d’oeurves. 

Artists’ Showplace is located at 15615 Coit Road, Suite 230, in the southwest quadrant of Spanish Village at Coit and Arapaho. Regular gallery hours are Tuesday through Saturday from 10 a.m. to 6 p.m. Artists’ Showplace also has workshops held throughout the year given by internationally renowned artists and offers weekly art lessons in its fully equipped classrooms.

What:

Art to Heart by Artists’ Showplace gallery owners

Where:

Artists’ Showplace gallery
15615 Coit Road, Suite 230

When:

February 3-25, 2012

Reception:

Friday,  February 10, 6-9 p.m. – free to the public

Gallery Hours:

Tuesday-Saturday, 10 a.m. to 6 p.m.
Phone number: 972-233-1223.
www.theartistsshowplace.com

1000 Yard by Eric Villarreal

Cuentos de la Ciudad: The Art of Eric Villareal
Artes de la Rosa
Opening February 10, 2012

As part of it’s 2011/2012 Season of art, entertainment and culture, Artes de la Rosa Cultural Center for the Arts is proud to showcase the artwork of Eric Villarreal in the exhibit, Cuentos de la Ciudad. The exhibit will open on February 10^th starting at 6:00 pm with a light reception. Eric Villarreal will be on hand to discuss his artwork and meet and greet the public.

The Artes de la Rosa Gallery is located at 1442 N. Main St., Fort Worth, TX  76164. For more information please call Producing Director Mark Alcala 817-735-1117 or visit www.artesdelarosa.org.

About the Exhibit

Exploring the world of his childhood, Artist Eric Villarreal offers a vivid yet moody view of the community he grew up in. Depicting images of ‘el barrio’ with vivid color and strong imagery, he unfolds breathtaking stories that serve as testemant to the lives surrounding all artists.

From the Artist

Growing up, there weren’t any galleries or museums to expose me to the great artists of the past and present. I relied mainly on television and movies to expose me to artistic visions and style. Media has had a great impact on how I perceive the world. Therefore, it is only natural that it extends to my paintbrush as well. Recently, I have simplified the backgrounds and concentrated more on the figure itself. My aim is to set the mood between art and viewers, allowing the audience to reach their own conclusions to the story that is untold. My paintings are not only my observations on the world, but a testament of my life and the people I surround myself with.

Ghost of a Good Thing by Eric Villarreal

Portrait of Carolus-Duran by John Singer Sargent, 1879

Sargent’s Youthful Genius: Paintings from the Clark
Amon Carter Museum of American Art
March 11 through June 17, 2012

On March 11, 2012, the Amon Carter Museum of American Art presents four masterworks by John Singer Sargent (1856–1925), the preeminent expatriate painter of the late 19th century. In Sargent’s Youthful Genius: Paintings from the Clark, four renowned works from the Sterling and Francine Clark Art Institute will travel to Texas for the first time. The exhibition is on view through June 17; admission is free.

Sargent’s legendary canvas Fumée d’Ambre Gris (Smoke of Ambergris) is among the four works in the exhibition. Created in 1880, this magnificent oil on canvas stands among the most remarkable of all the artist’s paintings, highly prized for its ambiguous narrative and exquisite color scheme of cream on white. The exhibition also includes Portrait of Carolus-Duran (1879), Sargent’s spirited portrait of his Parisian art instructor Carolus-Duran (1837–1917), as well two entrancing scenes from Sargent’s excursions to Italy, A Venetian Interior (1880–82) and A Street in Venice (1880–82).

“All four paintings display an informality and unconventional lack of finish, forecasting Sargent’s emergence as a modern painter,” says Rebecca Lawton, curator of paintings and sculpture at the Amon Carter. “Together, they also offer profound insight into the development of Sargent’s singular talent between 1879 and 1882, before he reached the age of 30.”

In 1910, Robert Sterling Clark—entrepreneur, soldier, explorer and an heir to the Singer sewing machine fortune—settled in Paris and began collecting works of art, an interest he inherited from his parents. When he married Francine Clary in 1919, she joined him in what became a shared, lifelong passion.

The Clarks’ collection grew exponentially over the ensuing years. Following World War II, they worked to establish a public museum to house their holdings, and in 1955 the Sterling and Francine Clark Art Institute opened in Williamstown, Mass. The Clarks possessed a discerning eye for collecting, and many of the works they accumulated are today iconic.

“It’s a true honor for us to exhibit these tremendous works amongst our collection,” says Andrew Walker, director. “Sargent was one of the most influential American artists living and working abroad in the 19^th century, and these four works are among his best, defining his ‘youthful genius.’ We encourage our visitors to take advantage of this unique opportunity to see these paintings; they are spectacular.”

Sargent’s Youthful Genius: Paintings from the Clark is presented at the museum as part of a joint program with the Kimbell Art Museum, which will concurrently show the exhibition The Age of Impressionism: Great French Paintings from the Clark. Sargent’s Youthful Genius: Paintings from the Clark and The Age of Impressionism: Great French Paintings from the Clark were organized by the Sterling and Francine Clark Art Institute, Williamstown, Mass.

Free Public Programs

Thursday, March 29, 2012
6–7 p.m.
3 Under 30 Gallery Talk

Rebecca Lawton, Curator of Paintings and Sculpture, Amon Carter Museum of American Art

Get inspired as you learn about the great works created by Frederic Edwin Church, Arthur Dove and John Singer Sargent during their twenties. No reservations are required.

Sunday, April 22, 2012
1–4 p.m.
Young Masters Family Funday

Discover artists on display at the Amon Carter who created masterpieces at a young age, and then have your young artists create inspired artworks of their own! No reservations are required.

About the Sterling and Francine Clark Art Institute

The Clark is one of the few major art museums that also serves as a leading international center for research and scholarship. The Clark presents public and education programs and organizes groundbreaking exhibitions that advance new scholarship, and its research and academic programs include an international fellowship program and conferences. Its 140-acre campus in the Berkshires of western Massachusetts includes Stone Hill Center, designed by Tadao Ando and opened in 2008, which houses galleries, meeting and classroom facilities, and the Williamstown Art Conservation Center. The Clark, together with Williams College, America’s foremost liberal arts college, sponsors one of the nation’s leading master’s programs in art history.

Portrait of Carolus-Duran by John Singer Sargent, 1879

the Lightning's Bride (detail) by Elliott Hundley, 2011 (photo by Joshua White)

Elliott Hundley: The Bacchae
Nasher Sculpture Center
January 28 through April 22, 2012

The Nasher Sculpture Center is pleased to present Elliott Hundley: The Bacchae, January 28 – April 22, 2012, featuring 11 recent medium- to large-scale wall-mounted and free-standing constructions highlighting Elliott Hundley’s investigations of the ancient Greek tragedy The Bacchae (ca. 406 BC) by Euripides.  Encompassing a variety of media including assemblage, theatrical staging, and photography, this exhibition continues the Nasher’s exploration of sculpture’s rich and myriad possibilities.

“Elliott Hundley has garnered accolades for his dazzling, densely-layered reliefs and free-standing sculptures that bring together in novel fashion an extraordinary array of materials” notes Nasher Sculpture Center director Jeremy Strick.  “His exhibition offers works that are at once remarkable technical achievements, and powerful meditations on topics both primal and contemporary.”

Hundley conceives of his imposing mixed-media collages—or bulletin boards, as he sometimes calls them—as theatrical landscapes that restage and animate classical texts. First orchestrating elaborate photo shoots using sitters who play characters from Greek mythology, he interweaves the resulting photos with a vast array of organic and found materials, from wood to textiles, bamboo to spray paint, and a variety of found ephemera. The works become dense narratives that take the form of monumental wall-mounted collages complemented by free-standing, obliquely figural sculptures. Drawing on classical mythology, art history, philosophy, and drama – subjects of long-standing interest to Hundley – he uses his idiosyncratic visual language to collapse historical and narrative time and to examine current social and political conditions.

The Bacchae is a tale of revenge set in the ancient city of Thebes. The god Dionysus (Bacchus to the Romans) has decided to punish its citizens when they refuse to accept his claim that he is the son of Zeus.  After bringing the women of Thebes under his influence, Dionysus leads them out of the city and into the wilderness where they join his followers, the Bacchae, in worshipping him in ecstatic rituals. The god then convinces the king of Thebes, Pentheus, to spy on the women, who, upon discovering him, mistake him for a wild beast. Led by Pentheus’s own mother, Agave, the women rip the king limb from limb, killing him in the process. Agave then returns to Thebes, carrying her son’s head as a trophy, still unaware of her delusion. When Dionysus’s influence on her finally loosens, she is horrified to discover that she has murdered her own son.

a foot against his ribs by Elliott Hundley, 2011 (photo by Joshua White)

Organized by the Wexner Center for the Arts at The Ohio State University, Elliott Hundley: The Bacchae will be accompanied by an ambitious book with new essays by Wexner Chief Curator Christopher Bedford, poet Anne Carson, noted art historian Richard Meyer, and Doug Harvey, artist, writer, critic, curator, and educator, addressing subjects including Hundley’s development over the last decade, his engagement with filmic traditions, Greek tragedy as his most consistent inspiration, and the intricacies of his working process.  The catalogue will be lavishly illustrated with studio images, sketches, photographs, and process shots unpublished to date.

Elliott Hundley received his MFA in 2005 from UCLA and currently lives in Los Angeles. He graduated from the Rhode Island School of Design with a BFA in printmaking in 1997 and also attended the Skowhegan School of Painting and Sculpture in 2002. His drawings and collages have been shown in group exhibitions in New York at Daniel Reich Gallery and Andrea Rosen Gallery, and in Los Angeles at Cherry and Martin, Regen Projects, and Peres Projects. His work is found in several important collections, including those of the Museum of Modern Art, New York; the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, New York; and the Museum of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles.

Elliott Hundley: The Bacchae was organized by the Wexner Center for the Arts at The Ohio State University and made possible by a significant contribution from Battelle. Generous support for this exhibition is also provided by The Broad Art Foundation and Lonti Ebers, New York.

Please note: In additional to the exterior sunscreen, fabric shades have been installed in the ceiling for this exhibition to protect the works of art from excessive light reflected into the galleries by Museum Tower.

swarming over by Elliott Hundley, 2011 (photo by Joshua White)

About the Nasher Sculpture Center

Open since October 2003, the Nasher Sculpture Center is dedicated to the display and study of modern and contemporary sculpture.  The Center is located on a 2.4-acre site in the heart of the Dallas Arts District.  Renzo Piano, a world-renowned architect and winner of the prestigious Pritzker Prize in 1998, is the architect of the Center’s 55,000-square-foot building.  Piano worked in collaboration with landscape architect Peter Walker on the design of the two-acre sculpture garden.

The Nasher Sculpture Center was the longtime dream of the late Raymond and Patsy Nasher, who together formed one of the finest collections of modern and contemporary sculpture in the world. The Raymond and Patsy Nasher Collection includes masterpieces by Calder, De Kooning, Di Suvero, Giacometti, Hepworth, Kelly, Matisse, Miró, Moore, Picasso, Rodin, and Serra, among others, and continues to grow and evolve.

The Nasher Sculpture Center presents rotating exhibitions of works from the Nasher Collection as well as special exhibitions drawn from other museums and private collections.  In addition to 10,000 square feet of indoor gallery space, the Center contains an auditorium, education and research facilities, a cafe, and a store.

The Nasher Sculpture Center is open Tuesday through Sunday from 11 am to 5 pm and until 11 pm for special events.  General Admission to the Center is $10 for adults, $7 for seniors, $5 for students, and free for members and children 12 and under.  For more information, visit www.NasherSculptureCenter.org.

the Lightning's Bride (detail) by Elliott Hundley, 2011 (photo by Joshua White)

On March 11, 2012, The Age of Impressionism: Great French Paintings from the Clark opens at the Kimbell Art Museum, the only U.S. venue for this first-ever international touring exhibition of French Impressionist masterpieces from the Sterling and Francine Clark Art Institute in Williamstown, Massachusetts. The Clark’s superb collection of French Impressionist paintings, which features a remarkable group of works by Pierre-Auguste Renoir, is renowned throughout the world. The Clark exhibition is touring for a period of three years (2011–14) and appears at major venues in Italy, France, Spain, the United Kingdom, Canada, Japan, and China.

“We are honored to showcase this extraordinary collection,” commented Eric M. Lee, director of the Kimbell Art Museum. “Because many of the Impressionists painted outdoors, their works will sing out especially vibrantly in the natural light of Louis Kahn’s renowned gallery spaces. Visitors to the Museum are in for a stunning encounter with beautiful art enhanced by iconic architecture.”

The Kimbell has a long tradition of hosting some of the most esteemed Impressionist collections from around the world, which began with its very first special exhibition, Impressionist and Post-Impressionist Paintings from the U.S.S.R (1973), drawn from the State Hermitage Museum in St. Petersburg and the State Pushkin Museum of Fine Arts in Moscow, and continued with exhibitions of works from the Courtauld Institute, London (1987); the Barnes Foundation, Merion, Penn. (1994); the Musée de l’Orangerie, Paris (2000–1); and the Art Institute of Chicago (2008).

The selection of 72 paintings in The Age of Impressionism includes 21 by Renoir, six by Claude Monet, seven by Camille Pissarro, four by Alfred Sisley, three by Edgar Degas, two by Edouard Manet, and two by Berthe Morisot. Many are celebrated masterpieces of Impressionism that visitors will recognize from reproductions even if they have never been to Williamstown to see them in person. The exhibition also features examples of the work of some leading French artists of the period who worked in alternative styles, including the landscape painters Camille Corot and Théodore Rousseau, figure painters William-Adolphe Bouguereau, Jean-Léon Gérôme, and Jacques-Joseph Tissot, and the post-Impressionist painters Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec and Paul Gauguin.

“The Age of Impressionism offers our visitors a chance to understand more than 70 great works of art through the personality and taste of the two remarkable collectors who founded the Clark Art Institute,” said George T.M. Shackelford, Kimbell deputy director. “Sterling Clark was an heir to the Singer sewing machine fortune, who married in 1919 Francine Clary—a Frenchwoman who had been an actress at the Comédie Française. Together, they assembled for their homes in Paris and New York one of the finest collections of paintings, sculpture, and drawings formed in the early 20th century.”

Although the French Impressionists were the heart of the collection, the Clarks ranged widely in their tastes—paintings by the Old Masters found favor, as well as works by the modern Americans John Singer Sargent and Winslow Homer. The couple founded the Clark Art Institute as a showcase for the collection in 1955. Although the Institute’s holdings have expanded greatly since then, notably through the addition of a growing collection of early photography, its scope and character continue to represent the interests of the founders.

The Age of Impressionism represents all the important types of painting that the Impressionists practiced, from landscapes to figure compositions and still lifes. Their near-magical mastery of effects of natural light comes through strongly in Monet’s springtime view of Tulip Fields at Sassenheim, near Leiden or Pissarro’s Piette’s House at Montfoucault, a winter scene. The Clark Renoirs are virtually an exhibition within the exhibition, representing the range of his subject matter and the evolution of his style from the 1870s to the 1890s. They include some of the most sensuous and seductive of all his works—such unabashed celebrations of youth and beauty as Girl with a Fan and Sleeping Girl. Among the other masterpieces of Impressionist figure painting in the exhibition is one of the most beautiful of Degas’s behind-the-scenes paintings of the ballet, Dancers in the Classroom, its off-centered composition reflecting the artist’s love of Japanese woodblock prints.

Grouped near the beginning of the exhibition, paintings such as Gérôme’s Fellah Women Drawing Water give a sense of the high level of technical “finish” practiced by older painters and beloved of more conservative taste during the Impressionist era. Again, it is to the credit of Sterling and Francine Clark that they were able to appreciate the work of artists other than their favorites of the Impressionist avant-garde. “Academic, yes, tight, yes,” Sterling Clark said of one of his paintings by Gérôme, “but what drawing and mastery of the art.”

The exhibition concludes by suggesting some of the stylistic paths that the Impressionists opened up for younger painters. Gauguin’s Young Christian Girl, for example, shows Impressionist technique and color deployed in a less purely descriptive, more personal and stylized manner.

The 240-page catalogue that accompanies The Age of Impressionism features essays by James A. Ganz and Richard R. Brettell. Ganz provides an introduction to the life and collecting of Sterling Clark, and Brettell discusses the Clarks in relation to other great American collectors of the early 20th century. The catalogue is published by Skira Rizzoli, New York.

This exhibition is supported by an indemnity from the Federal Council on the Arts and the Humanities. Promotional support is provided by American Airlines, the Fort Worth Star-Telegram, and NBC 5.

Visitor information is available on the exhibition website, impressionism.kimbellart.org.

The Clark at the Amon Carter Museum of American Art

Visitors to The Age of Impressionism at the Kimbell will have the opportunity to view some of the highlights of the Clarks’ American collection next door at the Amon Carter Museum of American Art. The Amon Carter is presenting John Singer Sargent’s celebrated painting Fumée d’Ambre Gris (Smoke of Ambergris), along with three other early Sargents, in the concurrent focus exhibition Sargent’s Youthful Genius: Paintings from the Clark.

Sterling and Francine Clark Art Institute

The Clark is one of the few major art museums that also serves as a leading international center for research and scholarship. The Clark presents public and education programs and organizes groundbreaking exhibitions that advance new scholarship. It also offers an international fellowship program and presents colloquia, symposia, and conferences in the U.S. and abroad. Its 140-acre campus in the Berkshires of western Massachusetts includes Stone Hill Center, designed by Tadao Ando and opened in 2008, which houses galleries, meeting and classroom facilities, and the Williamstown Art Conservation Center. The Clark, together with Williams College, America’s foremost liberal arts college, sponsors one of the nation’s leading master’s programs in art history.

Kimbell Art Museum

The Kimbell Art Museum, owned and operated by the Kimbell Art Foundation, is internationally renowned for both its collections and for its architecture. The Kimbell’s collections range in period from antiquity to the 20th century and include European masterpieces by artists such as Fra Angelico, Michelangelo, Caravaggio, Poussin, Velázquez, Monet, Picasso, and Matisse; important collections of Egyptian and classical antiquities; and Asian, Mesoamerican, and African art.

The Museum’s building, designed by the American architect Louis I. Kahn, is widely regarded as one of the outstanding architectural achievements of the modern era. A second building, designed by world-renowned Italian architect Renzo Piano, is scheduled to open in 2013 and will provide space for special exhibitions, allowing the Kahn building to showcase the permanent collection.

Twin World by Atsushi Fukui

Passage To The Future: Art from a New Generation in Japan
Untitled
Connie Swann
Blue Star Contemporary Art Center
March 1 through May 5, 2012

Opening reception is Thursday, March 1, 2012, from 6-9 p.m.

Blue Star Contemporary Art Center in San Antonio, Texas, has announced their spring 2012 exhibit schedule. The Exhibits include Passage To The Future: Art from a New Generation in Japan, , Untitled and Connie Swann. All exhibits open March 1 and run through May 5, 2012. All exhibits are free and open to the public.

Passage To The Future: Art from a New Generation in Japan

As part of Blue Star Contemporary Art Center’s international initiative, it has partnered with The Japan Foundation, an independent institution that serves as Japan’s main organization for international cultural exchange, to bring an internationally traveling exhibition of contemporary Japanese artwork to San Antonio.

This exhibition focuses on art produced in Japan at the beginning of the 21st century. It showcases the work of eleven artists who are presently attracting a great deal of international attention. The 1990s saw major shifts in the economic and political order of the world, and many people have responded by turning away from larger issues and concentrating on smaller and more intimate areas of life, in essence, reexamining the ground under their own feet. In contemporary art as well, there has been a worldwide tendency for artists to take a greater interest in everyday life and focus on the expression of very personal perceptions and feelings.

This exhibition presents paintings, sculptures, installations, photographs, and video works by eleven Japanese artists who are responding in a similar way to the current state of the world. They take their subject matter from their immediate surroundings and make art that strongly reflects their own personal reality. Their work has a rich visual impact and reveals a strong interest in the process of making things.

Exhibiting Artists: Maywa Denki, Miyuki Yokomizo, Tetsuya Nakamura, Yoshihiro Suda, Satoshi Hirose, Tomoyasu Murata, Tabaimo, Nobuyuki Takahashi, Atsushi Fukui, Masafumi Sanai, Katsuhiro Saiki.

Untitled

Curator of the University of Texas at San Antonio’s art collection, Arturo Almeida, will curate an exhibition featuring two Latina artists in Blue Star Contemporary Art Center’s Project Space Gallery. More details will be announced.

Connie Swann

Gallery 4 will feature artwork by San Antonio artist, Connie Swann. More details will be announced.

Blue Star Contemporary Art Center

Blue Star Contemporary Art Center is a non-profit, non-collecting contemporary art center in San Antonio, Texas that advances the growth and understanding of contemporary art, artists and the curatorial process. Through exhibitions and a variety of programs, Blue Star is an active participant in the development of regional, national and international contemporary art and provides a lively forum for the visual arts dialogue. For more information visit www.bluestarart.org.

Blue Star Contemporary Art Center is located at 116 Blue Star, San Antonio, Texas.

Twin World by Atsushi Fukui

Four Seasons of El Paso: Spring, Summer, Fall and Winter by Hal Marcus, 1995 (images courtesy El Paso Museum of Art)

Hal Marcus Four Seasons
El Paso Museum of Art
January 24 through March 4, 2012

The El Paso Museum of Art will exhibit the 1995 artwork titled Four Seasons of El Paso by Hal Marcus in honor of his receiving the Diabetes Person of Vision Award from the El Paso Diabetes Association which will be awarded at the El Paso Museum of Art on February 11, 2012.

The vibrant colors of this Fauve-inspired, four-panel, acrylic on canvas depict the artist’s neighborhood in four seasons from four directions at four different times of the day. Using a similar composition, each panel is anchored by the green spire of the Saint Patrick’s Cathedral and the converging lines of a central street leading to a distant vanishing point near the mountainous horizon.

The El Paso native Marcus has worked as an independent artist since 1990, has mentored many artists while maintaining the Hal Marcus Gallery from 2000 to 2010, and has also generously donated artwork from his personal collection to the El Paso Museum of Art by artists such as: Manuel Acosta, Kate Krause Ball and Berla Emeree.

Parking

Parking is available at the Convention Center Garage, Mills Plaza Parking Garage and the Camino Real Hotel for a fee. Limited metered parking is available on Main Street.

The Sentimental Journey by Liz London, 2012

Liz London: Seeking Infinity
Mercantile Coffee House
January 26 through February 25, 2012

Opening reception with the artist is Thursday, January 26, 2012, from 6-7:30 p.m.

As part of the McKinney Avenue Contemporary’s community outreach program, the MAC has teamed up with Mercantile Coffee House to extend its contemporary artistic vision and educational support to downtown Dallas. This partnership will promote and support emerging talent with monthly exhibitions throughout the year. Donations from Mercantile Coffee House will benefit artistic programming at the MAC.

The upcoming exhibition at Mercantile Coffee House features Liz London’s Seeking Infinity. With the use of mixed media, Liz London presents an allegorical representation of personal adventures. Process becomes an important factor in London’s art making. Curiosities discovered from travel coalesced with painting, drawing, rubbing and collaging formulates the works on display. While working on various pieces collectively, the act of producing takes on a philosophical ceremony for London where mistakes are created, boundaries are pushed, questions are asked and icons are made.

Dallas based artist Liz London’s creative aspirations began as a child and flourished as the daughter of interior designers. London possesses a Bachelor of Arts degree in Public Relations from the University of Central Oklahoma and has studied under artists such as Dorothy Moses, B.J. White, Carolyn Barnes and Mark Briscoe. In 2006, London established the work shop Connecting through Collage, where she applies visual and meditative exercises to foster creativity. Her work has been commissioned by the new Omni Hotel and most recently exhibited in the Art Hash Group Show at Kettle Art.

The opening reception for Liz London: Seeking Infinity will be Thursday, January 26, 2012 from 6:00 -7:30pm. The exhibition will be on view through February 25, 2012.

Mercantile Coffee House will host monthly exhibitions of a variety of emerging artists and media, enhancing the setting and experience for visitors. Through the MAC’s innovative efforts and artistic advisement, visitors to The Mercantile Coffee House will have the opportunity to view and interact with contemporary art in a non-traditional setting. This initiative is congruent with the MAC mission of supporting experimentation and promoting a visual dialogue between the artist and the viewer.

When and Where

Monthly at The Mercantile Coffee House
1800 Main Street Dallas, TX 75201

About the MAC

Established in 1994, The McKinney Avenue Contemporary (The MAC) is a nonprofit
organization that stands as a Dallas advocate for creative freedom offering the opportunity for experimentation and presentation of art in all disciplines. It supports the emerging and established artist role in society providing a forum for critical dialogue with their audiences. This relationship is cultivated through education and innovative programming. The MAC is a member of Dallas Art Dealers Association and The Uptown Association.

Call 214-953-1212 for information or visit www.the-mac.org. The MAC is open Wednesday – Saturday 11 a.m. – 9:00 p.m.

About Mercantile Coffee House

Mercantile Coffee House is a business hip place to have a great cup of premium coffee, espresso or tea. Mercantile Coffee House features the best coffee beans of 2010, Intelligentsia. It serves world famous Yogen Fruz frozen Yogurt and Smoothies made to your liking. The Mercantile Coffee House is a comfortable environment to enjoy the first cup of coffee for the day, a convenient place to meet with your colleagues or hook up with friends. It is also technology friendly with ample laptop plug ins, free high speed Wi-Fi and a Free Conference Room use for your more serious meetings. For a limited time only Mercantile Coffee House is offering the finest bean to bar chocolate in the US, Amano Chocolate. Visit Mercantile Coffee House online at www.mchdallas.com.

The Sentimental Journey by Liz London, 2012