Austin Art Talk

"I think artists are extremely inspirational people. You need a lot of mental discipline to continue to affirm the role of creativity and your voice in the conversation. That’s why I think artists are so important because it's just a really important point of view and perception in this cacophony that we hear. Especially now it's really good to bend your ear towards maybe more nuanced, more complicated, more complex murmurings and conversations about issues that artists are giving us."

Chris has to be one of the biggest champions of artists I have spoken with. She is really passionate about her job and getting people to experience, understand, and collect art. I love this conversation. I had been so curious to learn more about Women & Their Work and about Chris and her job and this interview does not disappoint.

Text courtesy of the Women & Their Work website.

Women & Their Work is a visual and performing arts organization located in Central Austin that serves as a catalyst for contemporary art created by women living and working in Texas and beyond. For 40 years, Women & Their Work has brought groundbreaking art to Austin, with exhibitions, performances, and educational workshops.

Known for its pioneering spirit, embrace of artistic innovation, and commitment to Texas audiences and artists, Women & Their Work’s goal is to enrich the cultural experience for Texans by:

Admission to the gallery is free. Donations are appreciated.

Gallery hours are Monday through Friday 10am to 6pm

1710 Lavaca Street

512-477-1064

General Inquires

Red Dot Art Spree 2019

Opening - Thu Sep 12, 2019 7:00pm – 10:00pm

Looking for tickets to the party on opening night? Click here.

Exhibition - Fri Sep 13, 2019 - Sun Sep 22, 2019

For art lovers in Austin, Women & Their Work’s Red Dot Art Spree means red-hot buys on original works of art at $750 or less and a paint-the-town-red night. Join us on Thursday, September 12th from 7- 10 pm. This year’s event will feature over 150 works by some of the best contemporary artists in Texas. Paintings, sculptures, drawings, photographs, prints and mixed media works will be priced $750 and below, and all shopping that night will be tax-free.

A silent auction will offer items and services ranging from art-inspired travel getaways to gift certificates from some of Austin’s most sought-after establishments. There will be fabulous fare and cocktails making this the perfect occasion for artists, collectors, and creatives to come together for a night of artistic celebration!

Some of the subjects we discuss:

Chris’s job

Intro music generously provided by Stan Killian

Support this podcast.

Links:

• Women & Their Work

“I’m always trying to be tranquil. I’ve experienced a lot of sadness and crisis and trauma in the last 10 years. I think there is a part of me that could have gone that direction and you would have been able to see it in my work. I have done some small pieces where they do look angry. But as far as the larger pieces, I would always feel like if I was working on something that gave that message that it didn’t really calm me. It didn’t really work for me as art therapy which is at the time what I wanted it to do. I wanted it to be able to take me to a quiet place. A thoughtful place. I wanted it to be about love and community, not anger or separation.”

Opening reception: Saturday, September 14th | 7-9 pm

September 14 – October 12

Davis Gallery & Framing

In partnership with the Peabody Fund and Dell Children’s Medical Center, Davis Gallery is honored to announce a unique group show in support of Davis’ own Jan Heaton, one of Austin’s premier watercolorists. In February of 2019 Jan’s daughter, Kristin Peabody, was taken by an aggressive cancer she had battled for ten years. In place of the solo exhibition that was scheduled for Jan, Davis Gallery and Austin’s artistic community are banding together in solidarity to fight cancer and find strength. Over sixty artists have contributed 4x4 inch squares of their own original artwork in an overall pink palette that will be hand-stitched together to create a pink quilt, symbolizing the community’s compassion, strength, and friendship. The idea for the pink quilt is derived directly from Kristin's feeling that the love she had been shown over the course of her treatments felt like a "big, warm, pink blanket of love". In addition to this collaborative quilt, an extended group show focused on love, gratitude, and family will feature original artwork by Jan Heaton and over twenty other artists.

Ten percent of the proceeds raised during this four weeklong exhibit will be donated to the Peabody Fund, a project set up in direct response to Kristin Peabody’s ambition to help develop innovative work in cancer research through the San Diego Center for Personalized Immunotherapy. The “big pink blanket of love” collaborative quilt will be donated to the Dell Children’s Medical Center’s fundraiser, “The Art of Giving”, an annual fundraiser dedicated to providing art and music therapy for thousands of young cancer patients.

My paintings are personal observations of color, movement, relationships and forms in nature. I prefer the watercolor medium, as I love paper, and the tactile manner in which the pigment integrates with the paper. Painting on cold pressed 100% cotton paper I patiently build translucent, veiled layers of color, allowing the forms and values to evolve in a detailed and orchestrated manner. I normally work in a series, which permits the wet color to dry thoroughly between layers. The images are not restricted by the paper’s edges. Every random mark is there because it needs to be there. The reputed “happy mistakes” (that watercolor legend reports often occur in this medium) are planned and controlled.

The circular orbs in my current work are simple, bold, direct, sensual, playful and often mysterious. The sphere recalls harmony, rhythm, movement, patterns, and boundless symbolic metaphors. In my work the circle exists independently and in groups, referencing water patterns on a shore, or a rising moon, rounded fruits, or the shape of a flower. The circle reminds me of family and friends, who are very important to my creative process. The times spent in a circle, talking, eating, dancing, playing, telling stories and solving the problems of everyday life. The memories of this connection to the circle are important to me.

My intention is not to impose a specific message to the viewer. I often hesitate to title my paintings, for fear that they will be translated only according to my vision and close a door to the viewer’s interpretations. I hope my paintings will allow the viewer to observe a familiar object in a new way.

How we met

This interview has been edited and condensed for clarity.

Intro music generously provided by Stan Killian

Support this podcast.

Links:

• Jan Heaton Studio

"My most recent work there seems to be more of an embrace going on between parts as opposed to these diverse parts fitting together, maintaining their diversity. They seem now to be more a part of each other. That’s a mystery to me."

I keep returning to a beautiful quotation which has become something of a touchstone for me. The quotation is from Italo Calvino’s book, Mr. Palomar, and is a description of a flock of blackbirds flying over Rome. The narrator describes the flock as a “…moving body composed of hundreds and hundreds of bodies, detached, but together forming a single object…something…that even in fluidity achieves a formal solidity of its own.”

This idea of independent parts coalescing into a whole, only to collapse again into singular units, is one that has interested me for many years. Inherent in this idea is a sense of continuity, but a continuity constantly threatened with disintegration. It also suggests a state of suspension, where hierarchy yields to endless associations and connections.

In addition to these conceptual interests are more concrete references. Some are from the world around me: geologic formations (specifically the unstable limestone walls so common in Central Texas), pixels, and atoms. Some are artistic references, including Italian mosaic, pointillism, process painting, and pattern and decoration.

These diverse influences hold in common the theme of fragmentation. The question is whether these fragments are nostalgic reminders of a past presence, or conversely, the beginnings of a new form. The answer is never clear, which is why I remain interested in the question.

Introduction

Intro music generously provided by Stan Killian

Support this podcast.

Links:

• Sydney Yeager: Paintings

"I just think that we have a greater strength en masse. The more we can come together and support each other the greater our potential. Don’t build walls. Don’t tell people they cant do it. Show up for the people you think that you can, and you have the strength to."

Through Aug. 18

Dimension Gallery

My sculptural work is driven by the goal to arouse a deep visceral response in the viewer. I work to achieve this by creating a heightened tension in the interaction of two systems, defined as rigid and fluid. Steel structures, once assembled into a specific form, are fixed and unchanging. The fluid systems they contain introduce a temporal element in which there is no longer a definite object, but a shifting one. The use of a steel mold elicits the feeling of an unchanging model, yet the bulbous forms interact with this foundation in abstract, organic, and often unexpected ways. I draw inspiration from larger systems found in nature and society, which represent the push and pull of containment and expansion, strength and fragility, and change and inertia. This interplay creates a push and pull that is dynamic, as perception of the work becomes reliant on the individuals own deep emotive response as they perceive it.

I began this body of work by capturing air, water, and soft pliable materials within my rigid structures to really focus in on the change and enertia that couldn’t be stopped in their interaction. This created a movement in the work I really loved. As sculptures would melt from within, deflate, or slowly wither away, I found the audience would interact with them in interesting and dynamic ways. The work was never static. During the next phase of this work’s evolution I transitioned into glass as my mode of movement in the hopes that the pieces would represent a more fixed object and potentially increase their ability to be collected. During this next phase within my studies I aim to employ my more developed skill set and experience with creating high end craft to realize them in a new and even more dynamic way. I plan to use materials such as castable resins, fiberglass, and maybe even concrete, to increase the scale of these works as I work my way to the monumental. I have done the experiments, now I need the funding to make them big. I would like to produce three to five, 6’-12’ works this year, as well as an installation built from the culmination of several smaller pieces that could wrap and move around the gallery space.

Introduction

Intro music generously provided by Stan Killian

Support this podcast.

Links:

• greg david wright (@gdwright_art) • Instagram

“I’m not solely an artist, that’s not my identity. I’m not just an artist, I’m a vessel. You are not defined by your occupation. You are not defined by the person that you spend your life with. You’re a creation that’s meant for more than just being an accountant, or a photographer, or a painter, or a carpenter. You’re meant for much more than just that. You are meant to use that as a place to help people.”

When death leads to life, art is inevitable. And art, as creation, is a reflection of its creator. Brinston and his work consistently grapple with the revolution of death and life and death again. The cacophonous symphony of color and shape, rhythm and structure that compose his work is all at once chaotic and calm. Just as the artist himself is an amalgam of mania and peace. The composition of art and artist is indistinguishable… just as his art is an extension of himself, the artist has become an extension of his art. For the artist, art is valuable in its making life worth living. Art has given him purpose and meaning, the people he loves, the places he’s been, literal survival, a future. Art is everything. And now with everything, the artist seeks to share this existential gift through collaboration and demonstration. Impact the world through connection. Inform himself and those around him through interaction. Art is the universal teacher. And the artist’s goal is to help people find little bits of themselves through personal synergy with the art. The artist’s path from life to death and back to life again has not been without pain. But the vision of Christ plus the inevitable clarity of death have afforded him balance amidst chaos and a wealth of generosity through selfless invention. The artist creates not for glory, fame or control… but because he is an artist. And an artist creates.

Introduction

Intro music generously provided by Stan Killian

Support this podcast.

Links:

• BRINSTON (@matthewbrinston) • Instagram

"All of us as artists have inspiration that comes from a myriad of places. I felt just through a couple situations that had occurred, where I had not intended to do something, that the art had taken a life of its own separate from me. And I had seen the positive aspects associated with it, so it encouraged and motivated me to work hard to stay out of the way and to allow the inspiration to take place. And then once I acted on it the next piece was available to me. I think that’s one of the reasons I have been so prolific is because I was open and receptive to the inspiration and I didn’t question it and I acted on it."

Meeting in Marfa

WERRICK

100 East San Antonio

512-563-9403

[email protected]

Contemporary art by Werrick Armstrong.

Hours are variable–look for the “open” sign or by appointment

Intro music generously provided by Stan Killian

Support this podcast.

Links:

• Werrick Armstrong (@werrickarmstrong) • Instagram

"I think more and more now people are interested in this conversation of the intersection of art and culture with social movements. Art & culture have always been a part of social movements, but being strategic with artists inside of campaigns and things that we are trying to move forward, there’s a really rich conversation that’s happening now. It’s just really exciting to be in a place where I can be both-and. Because it has felt separate. There is something about being in tune with your imagination and creativity that allows for some creative thinking that can support what it is that we all want to move forward which is a more equitable world for us all."

This Ain't A Eulogy: A Ritual for Re-Membering from Taja Lindley on Vimeo.

An 80’s baby born in New York and raised in the South, Taja Lindley currently lives in Brooklyn, New York working as the Managing Member of Colored Girls Hustle. In 2007 she received her B.A. from New York University’s Gallatin School of Individualized Study where she designed her own major, concentrating in public policy and knowledge production with a focus on health and women of color.

Lindley is a memory worker, healer and an activist. Through iterative and interdisciplinary practices, she creates socially engaged artwork that reflects and transforms audiences, shifts culture and moves people to action. She uses movement, text, installation, ritual, burlesque, and multi-media to create immersive works that are concerned with freedom, healing and pleasure. She is currently developing a body of work recycling and repurposing discarded materials.

Her artwork has been featured at Spring/Break Art Show, Brooklyn Museum, Hammer Museum, Philbrook Museum, New York Live Arts, the American Repertory Theater at Harvard University, Brooklyn Arts Exchange (BAX), the Gallatin Arts Festival at New York University, WOW Café Theater, La Mama Theater, in living rooms, classrooms, conferences and public spaces. She has received coverage in the New York Times, VICE, ELLE, Blouin Art Info, Art Zealous and Artnet News, and ARTSY. In 2014 she was a Create Change Fellow with the Laundromat Project and selected to participate in EMERGENYC - an artist activist program of New York University’s Hemispheric Institute of Performance and Politics. In 2015 she was a Fall space grantee at BAX. Her 2017 residency at Dixon Place Theater culminated in the world premiere of her one-woman show "The Bag Lady Manifesta" in September 2017. This work is currently on a nationwide tour in the United States.

In addition to being an artist, Lindley is actively engaged in social movements as a writer, consultant, and facilitator. For over a decade she has worked with non-profits, research institutes and government on policies and programming that impact women and girls, communities of color, low/no/fixed-income families, queer people, youth and immigrants. Most recently, she served as a Sexual and Reproductive Justice Consultant at the NYC Department of Health and Mental Hygiene, facilitating a community driven process that created The NYC Standards for Respectful Care at Birth. She continues her work at the NYC Health Department as the current Public Artist in Residence, a program of the NYC Department of Cultural Affairs.

Her writing has appeared in Rewire, YES! Magazine, Feministe, Salon and EBONY. She is a member of Harriet's Apothecary and Echoing Ida.

Re-Membering is the Responsibility of the Living: An Installation by Taja Lindley

Closes Saturday July 27th, 2019

George Washington Carver Museum, Cultural and Genealogy Center

Open Hours:

The Carver Museum & Cultural Center will present the work of New York-based, multi-disciplinary visual and performing artist Taja Lindley. Her mixed media installation, "Re-Membering is the Responsibility of the Living," will be on view from March 7, 2019, to July 31, 2019. Moved by the non-indictments of the police officers responsible for the deaths of Eric Garner and Michael Brown, Lindley draws parallels between discarded refuse and the violent treatment of Black people in the United States. The artist uses re-purposed trash bags to re-member, honor and value the Black lives that have been lost due to state-sanctioned violence. In this post-Ferguson moment, Lindley is imagining how to recycle the energy of protest, rage, and grief into creating a world where, indeed, Black Lives Matter.

Image and text courtesy of The Carver Museum

Intro music generously provided by Stan Killian

Support this podcast.

Links:

• Taja Lindley

"It’s about looking, and continually trying to hone that and develop an eye."

APRIL 2019

AGAVE PRINT

Open 8:30 am - 5 pm

Exhibition Artist Statement

My lifelong fascination with architecture and the history of developing landscapes form the core components of my sculptures, photographs, films and videos.

The signage, border markers and fragmented shapes of buildings and background structures in transitional zones within the built environments of rural, exurban, industrial and urban landscapes have inspired many of the forms and surface textures in my objects.

Objects and artifacts observed in natural history museums have also been a lifelong source of visual inspiration. These items are often taken out of their context in their original environments and placed in formal display settings. This fascination has resulted in creation of objects that could be interpreted as functional devices, ritual objects, architectural models or as decorative items.

There is an additional series I refer to as portable objects -– self-contained, collapsible pieces designed for easy transport and setup. Some of the portables are fairly simple hinged devices and others are more complex. Pink Portable has hand-milled articulated hinges that allow the piece to be collapsed or extended in multiple configurations.

Recently I showed the newly completed Pink Portable to Lauren Jaben. She immediately suggested we display it in the window at Agave Print. The title of the current show “One Plus Eleven” refers to this initial selection and the eleven additional pieces she selected, including several objects that have not been previously shown.

I have long wanted to present a sculpture show with a variety of work and I am grateful to Lauren Jabens and Peter Williams for the opportunity to show my objects in their beautiful space at Agave Print.

Introduction

Intro music generously provided by Stan Killian

Support this podcast.

Links:

• Sev Coursen

"If I close it off then it’s not right. If you look at it and there’s only one answer, then it’s not right. So when I was talking about my older work, maybe it’s not technically good, but it brings up a question that everybody would give a different answer to. And not just other people. Quite often I’ll go back and see something I haven’t seen in a while and it will set off a whole new chain of thoughts."

Julie Speed: East of the Sun and West of the Moon

Taubman Museum of Art - Roanoke, VA

Saturday, August 31, 2019 - Sunday, March 15, 2020

Touring from the El Paso Museum of Art, Julie Speed: East of the Sun and West of the Moon explores the rich artistic production of Marfa, Texas, artist Julie Speed from the past five years, including many recent works previously unseen. Speed’s last museum show before East of the Sun and West of the Moon occurred in 2014 and was limited to works on paper.

Featuring twenty-nine works, the Taubman Museum of Art's presentation of Julie Speed: East of the Sun and West of the Moon consists of diverse works in the artist’s favorite media of oil, gouache, collage, and combinations thereof. Resident in Texas since 1978 and in Marfa since 2006, the artist forged her own path early on by ending her studies at the Rhode Island School of Design and devoting herself to imaginative figuration coupled with consummate technique. Sometimes described as neo-surrealist, Speed’s art holds affinity with the figurative Surrealism of René Magritte, yet her work offers scenarios that are simultaneously more personal and more complex than Magritte’s visual puns. Her art melds a technical mastery rivaling the Old Masters with motifs created from diverse sources ranging from Renaissance engravings to Japanese woodblock prints. As critic and curator Elizabeth Ferrer has written, “The contemporaneity of her art is rooted in its emphatically open-ended nature.”

Some of the themes examined in the exhibition and the accompanying catalog are Speed’s mixing of structured and spontaneous processes, her unique bridging of painting and collage, her playful dialogue with artistic tradition, and the intention and power of her art to spark myriad imaginings and narratives. The exhibition includes a “Close-Up Room” consisting of a three-channel video-and-sound installation designed by the artist and highlighting the processes and details of her art.

Julie Speed: East of the Sun and West of the Moon was organized by the El Paso Museum of Art and will be on view August 31, 2019 - March 15, 2020 in the Bank of America/Dominion Resources Gallery.

Text courtesty of Taubman Museum of Art website

When we met

Intro music generously provided by Stan Killian

Support this podcast.

Links:

• JULIE SPEED

"I feel that my capacity to create, in so many different forms of media, to step into my work as an activist, to speak in a very vulnerable way in the types of spaces I’ve been invited into, really began with writing about and sharing my deepest shame. And once I had finally illuminated that, and I had brought everything into the light, the things I was the most ashamed of, the things that caused me the greatest pain in my life, I was then able to speak and to explore my creativity in ways that I never had before because I didn’t feel there was anything I had to hide anymore. I think a lot of the fears that artists have, and many of the artists I have mentored over time, they tend to fixate on fears about the work, what work to create and how it’s going to be received. But I think really all those fears are a manifestation of shame. Because we don’t trust ourselves, and we don’t trust that we are enough, and that our truth is worth sharing. I think the remedy for that is healing relationships. Being in communities and in relationships with people that can finally reflect back to us, all of you is welcome here. And that if there is a truth you need to tell it will be heard, because you deserve to be heard."

Brooke Axtell is the Founder and Director of She is Rising, a healing community for women and girls overcoming rape, abuse and sex-trafficking. Through her mentorship programs, retreats and workshops, Brooke helps survivors become leaders. She is passionate about inspiring young women to reclaim their worth and express their power to create a more compassionate world.

Her work as a human rights activist led her to speak at The 2015 Grammy Awards, The United Nations and the U.S. Institute for Peace. She is a member of the Speaker’s Bureau for Rape, Abuse, Incest, National Network (R.A.I.N.N.), the largest anti-sexual assault organization in the U.S., and an Advisor for Freedom United, global initiative to end human trafficking.

Her work as a writer, speaker, performing artist and activist has been featured in many media outlets, including the New York Times, LA Times, Rolling Stone, Time Magazine, Wall Street Journal and CNN. Brooke has published several award-winning poetry books and released three CDs of original music to critical acclaim.

Beautiful Justice: Reclaiming My Worth After Human Trafficking and Sexual Abuse Paperback – April 2, 2019

A story of healing and a guide to seeking justice after sexual abuse from Brooke Axtell, one of the foremost survivor experts on sexual assault, domestic violence, and human trafficking

When Brooke Axtell was seven years old, her nanny subjected her to sex trafficking. Today, she is a champion and advocate for women around the world who have experienced sexual violence and trauma.

Beautiful Justice shares Brooke's own gripping story, both the trauma of sex trafficking and also her pathway through healing, moving on, and reclaiming power. Along the way, she imparts warm wisdom for others who have experienced similar violence, providing lessons from her own life and from the thousands of women, advocates, and lawmakers she's spoken with. Relying on her own experiences and a keen awareness of public policy, she provides a clear-eyed awareness of the ways that our culture and government work against women experiencing violence around the world.

Inspiring and powerfully redemptive, Brooke encourages readers to take part in a creative resistance as a path to justice.

Intro music generously provided by Stan Killian

Support this podcast.

Links:

• Beautiful Justice: Reclaiming My Worth After Human Trafficking and Sexual Abuse: Brooke Axtell: Amazon