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I had a lovely break in Houston. We were so well looked after and I felt completely spoilt
We were greeted by the Director Gary Tinterow at the Museum of Fine Arts, where we immediately faced with ‘Büsi (Kitty)’ by Fischli and Weiss, a work that is also in the Zabludowicz Collection. You would think he would have finished that plate of milk by now
Houston’s art scene appeared to be dominated by the Menil family; their philanthropy really has no bounds. Their house was built for Dominique and John de Menil by architect Philip Johnson in 1948, even though he had rejected it at first, he changed his mind after a visit towards the end of his career. Personally, I was not overwhelmed by its design but found the Charles James 1940s interior incredibly nostalgic. It was here where I discovered the doors that are featured in the Luisa Lambri photographs that are currently hanging in my home in Neve Zedek
Here is my Luisa Lambri photograph. I was most disappointed; in real life this looks like a load of old fitted wardrobes, whereas the photographs make them wondrous
Then it was time to have lunch in a lovely home where we were presented with an imaginative and tasty dessert after a delicious meal
There was not a corner un-curated. Even the shoe cupboard was a wonderment
The photograph collection was a hanging combination of connoisseur and curiosity
First stop was the Menil Main Collection where we were welcomed by the senior curator, Michelle White. Straight away we were confronted by Frank Bowling’s ‘Middle Passage’ from 1970, it really is a whopping show stopper
Then, to enhance the senses, we gravitated towards the surrealist room. The collection is world class and surpasses most public surrealist collections I have ever been to. My favourite Max Ernst painting was ‘Surrealism and Painting’, 1942
Just in case we were a little bored, we headed to a special pavilion dedicated to Dan Flavin who had created a permanent site-specific installation, completed two days before his death in 1996. There was a real feeling of reverence here, so much so that I almost wanted to get out the yoga mat and go into a meditative pose
Luckily we had time to drop into the cross site exhibition which looked at Latin America art
We then headed to the historical architecture project, ‘Project Row Houses’ which began in 1993 when it was founded by seven African American artists, including Rick Lowe
People took time to rest here and nostalgia filled our brains. We imagined back to the days when these shotgun houses (houses where the front door and back door were opposite each other to create a flow of air) were occupied by some of the hard-working African Diaspora community, and now these are used for artist residencies and housing for young mothers. After this, we visited some of the photographers the Menil Collection are supporting
Final stop of the day was the Inman Gallery where I met up with some really good artists. The first was Irish born Katrina Moorhead, who introduced her exhibition ‘seapinksea’, telling us about her heritage and explaining the meaning of her piece ‘long playing record’ which is a 3D rendering of flowers taken from the record cover of British group New Order’ album Power, Corruption and Lies
The next work we saw was ‘hanter’, a wooden shelf installation which rings the entire room and includes Moorhead’s work ‘Dark Botanical’, a flocked digital print featuring weeds grown under the sea, capturing an upside down landscape
We loved the work ‘Setlists for a Setting Sun (The Crystal Palace)’ by Dario Robleto, a sound artist, who refers to his practice as Sound Archeology. Here he has created a magical world by bringing back the first ever live recording of music (Handel’s “Israel in Egypt”) by Thomas Edison at the 1888 Crystal Palace World Art Fair
He has created a cabinet of curiosities in relation to this through an alchemical approach to artmaking
We met up with Jamal Cyrus who also talked about his work
