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    Are you listening?

    When the earth talks: Ground-breaking Hermann Park project brings the sounds of the planet to the surface

    Joel Luks
    Apr 12, 2014 | 10:32 am

    What if you could hear the temperature of the air? What if you could perceive what may be happening below the soil underneath your feet? What if the environment could talk?

    Writer, architect and experimental artist Abinadi Meza, an assistant professor at the University of Houston who's participating in the Cynthia Woods Mitchell Center for the Arts CounterCurrent Festival, believes Mother Nature may sound something like this:

    The material for Meza's sound installation at Hermann Park, titled Vein of Sky, was sourced from microsensors that recorded environmental data from the park's surroundings — light levels, humidity in the air, wind speeds, soil vibrations. The information captured was organized as streams of numbers that he translated into an ambient sound milieu. Vein of Sky isn't designed to be understood literally, but rather as a symbolic backdrop that encourages listeners to feel the atmosphere around them differently.

    "I hope that visitors have a shift in perception in regards to the immediate natural environment, that they form a poetic relationship with it and that they leave with a different sense of the atmosphere around them."

    "Humans can't hear light, we can't hear tremors in the soil, we can't hear the movements of plants," Meza explains. "I wanted to tap into this invisible skin and offer visitors the means to experience the environment in a way that's generally not perceptible."

    Vein of Sky, on view through March 2015, is housed at an open-air, solar-powered sculpture that illustrates the fundamentals of sustainable architecture and design. ReFRAME x FRAME — a project led by LEED architect and UH Graduate Design/Build Studio director Patrick Peters with support from graduate students from the Gerald D. Hines College of Architecture — is crafted from steel and repurposed office furniture as a temporary shelter suitable for the aftermath of natural disasters. The micro pavilion is part of Hermann Park's centennial public art project, Art in the Park.

    The installation is located on the banks of McGovern Lake, near the Pinewood Cafe.

    Meza responded to the spirit of ReFRAME x FRAME and Hermann Park by coding his collected data into a piece that's triggered when someone enters the space. Vein of Sky begins with simple electronic language that randomly increases in complexity and intensity the longer a visitor interacts with the temporary pavilion. With the help of a graduate student, Meza formulated software to automate the execution of his experimental installation.

    "The authorship in my role as the composer and sound artist comes in rephrasing the supply of data to express it in a sensory way," he says. "Although I could have mapped the numbers as pixels on a screen, I found sound to be a better conduit for this investigation."

    Meza considers the genre of sound to be spatially enveloping. Sound demands a visceral reaction that stirs the imagination into fantastical imagery. To work with sound isn't to bypass a visual element, but rather to enhance it.

    "I hope that visitors have a shift in perception in regards to the immediate natural environment, that they form a poetic relationship with it and that they leave with a different sense of the atmosphere around them," he says.

    Vein of Sky is housed at an open-air installation that illustrates the fundamentals of sustainable architecture and design.

    ReFRAME x FRAME
      
    Photo by Joel Luks
    Vein of Sky is housed at an open-air installation that illustrates the fundamentals of sustainable architecture and design.
    unspecified
    news/arts

    a very fine house

    Pioneering Houston Latino folkart gallery will close next year

    Tarra Gaines
    Jun 5, 2025 | 9:30 am
    ​Macario and Chrissie Ramirez.
    Photo by Agapito Sanchez
    Macario and Chrissie Ramirez.

    It’s the end of a cultural era as Chrissie Ramirez, owner of the Heights gallery and cultural space Casa Ramirez Folkart Gallery, announced that after 40 years she will close the 3,000-plus-square-foot space on W. 19th St. at the end of the current lease period in March 2026.

    \u200bMacario and Chrissie Ramirez.
      

    Photo by Agapito Sanchez

    Macario and Chrissie Ramirez.

    Filled with traditional art, especially paintings and sculptures, the space also showcased textiles, home accessories, religious objects, clothing, literature, and antiques. But it was the husband-and-wife owners, Macario and Chrissie Ramirez, who turned this Casa into a real home for the local Latino community, as well as a cultural landmark in Houston’s art landscape. Macario Ramirez founded Casa Ramirez in 1985 to honor his father, a folk artist and part-time jeweler who had his own business in San Antonio selling Mexican crafts. Over 40 years, Macario and Chrissie's longtime support for Latino artists along with the gallery's culturally rich programming and educational outreach helped to popularize Mexican and Latin American folk art and traditions.

    Chrissie Ramirez continued her husband’s mission after his death in 2020, keeping the gallery and his life’s work going. After five years running the business, she wants to travel and lead a less scheduled live. Houstonians won’t have to say goodbye just yet, as Ramirez says they will stay stay open and continue their annual holiday celebrations and programming.

    “Casa Ramirez will continue to operate as a retail establishment and offer the colorful mix of folk art, crafts, work by local artists and focus on the vibrant culture and traditions of Mexico, Latin American and the Southwest that we are so well known for and held in our hearts for so long,” Ramirez said in a statement.

    Throughout her remarks, Ramirez recalled her husband’s pioneering cultural and civil rights work in the community and his continuing legacy in Houston.

    Prominent Texas author, analyst, radio host, and Nuestra Palabra founder Tony Diaz spoke about the cultural reach Case Ramirez had over the years. Diaz especially credits Macario Ramirez and the gallery for helping to make Dia de los Muertos such an important Texas holiday and for helping to spread understanding of its celebrations in the U.S.

    “Today Day of the Dead is socially acceptable —it’s a movie by Disney. That was not always the case,” Diaz said. “There was a moment in our history when people would see the sugar skulls that are now beloved and they would think that it had something to do with ‘other things.’ You could come to Casa Ramirez, and the street would be full with our gente who knew that it was something beautiful to preserve. And before the rest of the nation caught on, Casa Ramirez was the home for that dear celebration of ours. ”

    Though she might be retiring, Ramirez says she will keep the name Casa Ramirez for future projects and activities in other locations. She also plans to continue her cultural work, with a focus on organizing “the collection of writings, documents, and artifacts” that are part of the Casa Ramirez and her family’s history with a goal to “archive them for their educational and historical value.”

    Ramirez emphasized that Casa Ramirez will remain open until March. She will spend this time “clearing, closing, and cleaning out” the gallery, but has plans for holiday and closeout sales before shuttering the space for good. It will still host traditional annual gatherings and programs for the rest of the year, including Hispanic Heritage Month in September, the Day of the Death holiday celebrations in October/November, and Christmas and New Years programming with special guests and music events in the works. Thankfully, that means Houstonians still have plenty of time to visit and share their own memories of this extraordinary Casa.

    casa ramirez folkart galleryclosingsthe-heightsvisual-art
    news/arts

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