No Images? Click here
MEDIA CONTACT:
Lauren Macknight, Public Affairs Coordinator
lauren.macknight@austin.utexas.edu; (512) 471-1852
Placeholder
Victor Pérez–Rul, Cristal 04a, 2014, unusual potassium sodium tartrate crystals, solar powered hardware, 10 x 12 cm
UT’s Visual Arts Center announces 2016–2017 season
AUSTIN, TX — The Visual Arts Center in The Department of Art and Art History at The University of Texas at Austin is pleased to announce its 2016–2017 season, presenting works by a dynamic lineup of emerging and established artists from around the world exploring a variety of themes.
In the fall, the Vaulted Gallery will feature the work of Mexico City-based artist Victor Pérez-Rul in the multi-part exhibition Placeholder, which runs from Sept. 23 through Dec. 10. Pérez-Rul’s will collaborate with UT students in art, physics, engineering, architecture and design to create an immersive installation that recycles solar and kinetic energy, bringing into harmony the movements of humans, sun and wind. Maquettes of Perez-Rul's related work—solar-powered pods that emit sound and light at night—will be exhibited on the outdoor plaza of Austin's Mexican American Cultural Center (MACC). Both projects are curated by Leslie Moody Castro (M.A., Art Education, 2010). This exhibition is made possible by a generous grant from the National Endowment for the Arts.
The fall opening reception will feature DJ set by Chulita Vinyl Club.
In the spring, the Vaulted Gallery will feature work from visual artist Ann Hamilton in O N E E V E R Y O N E from Jan. 27 through Feb. 4. In 2015, Landmarks, UT’s public art program, commissioned Hamilton to create a series of portraits for the new Dell Medical School. Hamilton photographed more than 500 local volunteers through a semi-opaque membrane that focuses each point where the body makes contact, extending a tactile experience into a visual form. Hamilton’s exhibition at the VAC includes smaller panels and working studies, as well as a 900-page book available to the public for free.
Ann Hamilton, O N E E V E R Y O N E · Connor, 2017. Courtesy of Landmarks, the public art program of The University of Texas at Austin.
Throughout the year, the Visual Arts Center will host multiple exhibitions in its galleries:
MOVING MOUNTAINS: Extractive Landscapes of Peru by Edi Hirose & Nancy La Rosa (Sept. 23–Dec. 10), which will feature the work of Lima artists who are documenting the causes and effects of quarrying and mining on the Peruvian landscapes through photographs, drawings, prints and video works. Curated by Dorota Biczel, PhD candidate in Art History
Everyday Ogres (Sept. 23–Dec. 10) presents three environmental video and sound installations by Tania Mouraud, including a newly commissioned work on oil refineries along the Houston Ship Channel. Viscerally powerful, Mouraud’s videos immerse viewers in sites of industrial manufacturing, exposing the disjunction between our everyday reliance on such industries and the destructive forces they enact against local landscapes, ecosystems and communities. Curated by Allison Myers, PhD candidate in Art History.
FIELDWORK (Sept. 23–Dec. 10), perennial gallery project space for faculty and students, will feature projects and exhibitions produced by Department of Art and Art History faculty members James Walker, Michael Mogavero, Jason Urban, Jeff Williams and Heidi Powell, in the East Gallery.
Queer Terrortories (Nov. 18–Dec. 10) is a group exhibition that brings together emerging contemporary artists who engage politics of anti-assimilation. Through performance, multimedia installation, drawing and photography, the featured artists in this exhibition consider the aesthetics of terror in relation to acts of queerness and illustrate the radical way in which queer artists define their own physical and emotional territories. Curated by the VAC’s student organization, Center Space Project.
Research Image/Search Asteroid (Sept. 23–Oct. 14) highlights the collaboration between Cory Fitzgerald and Studio Art graduate student Bucky Miller that explores the absurd and surreal in photographic documentation during the artists’ travels together. Fitzgerald and Miller play with photography’s peculiar relationship to time, memory and history. Curated by the VAC’s student organization, Center Space Project.
Omnibus Filing (Jan. 27–Feb. 24) displays the results of Design Professor James Sham’s program Rapid Design Pivot, which embeds artists into laboratory environments to conduct creative projects in collaboration with UT researchers. Artists Daniel Bozhkov, Patrick Killoran, Steven Brower and James Sham have been trained and embedded into various UT laboratories from 2016-2017 with the mandate to collaborate, cross-pollinate and catalyze innovation with various researchers and scientists. This project is curated by James Sham and Brian A. Choral
FIELDWORK (Jan. 27–Feb. 24), which will feature projects and exhibitions produced by Department of Art and Art History faculty members Ann Reynolds and Teresa Hubbard.
Two Christmases and a Half-Birthday (Jan. 27–Feb. 24) features the work of four B.F.A. Studio Art students who push the definition of home past its simple understanding as a permanent physical shelter or kinship. The exhibition was organized by Center Space Project, the student arts organization of the Visual Arts Center that oversees the Center Space gallery, an exhibition space that showcases the artistic and curatorial work of undergraduate and graduate students at The University of Texas at Austin. Curated by the VAC’s student organization, Center Space Project.
Performances (Jan. 27–Feb. 24) unites three bodies of work by photographer Elizabeth Bick: Street Ballet, Every God and Coda. All three demonstrate that the stage is not so distinct from the street, as performers and pedestrians navigate looking and being looked at. Curated by Elizabeth Welch, PhD Art History.
Later in the spring, the Visual Arts Center will host the Department of Art and Art History student exhibitions. From March 10 through April 7, the VAC will showcase the work of B.F.A. Studio Art seniors in the Senior Art Exhibition, alongside the work of B.F.A. Design seniors in the Senior Design Exhibition. From April 21 through May 13, the VAC will host the M.F.A. Thesis Exhibition and Design M.F.A. Thesis Exhibition.
The exhibitions and programs at the Visual Arts Center are made possible in part by the the Curtis R. and Carol O. Kayem Endowment for the Visual Arts Center, VAC Founding Donors, and the Underwriter’s Circle. Additional support for the 2016-2017 season comes from the National Endowment for the Arts, Stratus Properties Inc. and Suzanne Deal Booth. Refreshments for the opening fall reception are provided generously by Austin Beer Garden Brewing Co. and Cold Ones Pops.
More information about these exhibitions can be found at utvac.org. High-resolution images are available upon request.