Houston's best new holiday shows are naughty, nice and wonderful

The middle of summer is traditionally a time for Houston art galleries, museums, and institutions to take a bit of a breather, allowing art lovers a chance to catch up with spring exhibitions in cool art spaces. But this July keeps the art openings coming as the month brings several celebratory shows and intriguing exhibitions of local artists. Let’s enjoy a sizzling summer of art as the MFAH honors our nation’s big 250; Art Club unveils a new lineup of exhibits; and Avenida Houston expands our art horizons.

Art Club’s New Season at POST (ongoing)
When Art Club, the immersive space and DJ venue opened over a year ago, it promised Houston art lovers and club goers this techno art museum would continue to change and evolve over time with new artists and large-scale installations. Now with 12 fresh, radical, and cutting edge, gallery-sized works for the summer, it has certainly delivered on that promise. Created by individual artists, collectives, and international design studios, the new exhibits send visitors into kinetic light space and beguiling soundscapes. Many of the installations merge ancient cultures and practices with some of the most high tech art mediums, taking visitors into a different strange, alien world with each gallery, but ones that always echo with human connection.

One highlight of the new season is Lina Dib’s “Here and Now,” where beautiful yet eerie flower descend from a darkened sky, blooming to a soundscape of migratory bird sounds made by human immigrants to Houston. Art Club’s mirrored "infinity room" gets a new resident in Orkhan Mammadov’s “Visions,” which merges a thousand years of art history with machine learning.

Light artist Sasha Kojjio processes large bodies of text through sorting and generating algorithms, spinning the results into light until meaning dissolves and only movement remains. For Sphere³ II, international design studio Radugadesign, explores ancient Greek geometry through light, mirrors, and sound, creating an object that feels as if it could transport humans across space and time.

“This season, we’ve continued to bring new media art from around the world to Houston with digital art ranging from the Islamic world to the Incan traditions of the Andes,” said Kirby Liu, founder and curator of Art Club Houston and managing director of POST. “The theme is the conviction that the binaries we use to see the world – whether analog versus digital, human versus machine, or tradition versus technology – are no longer doing the work we ask of them.”

“Horizon” at The Plaza at Avenida Houston (now through September 7)
Outdoor art gets expansive with these new interactive installations set between George R. Brown Convention Center and Discovery Green. Created by acclaimed multidisciplinary artist and set designer, Olivier Landreville, in collaboration with sound and light designer, Serge Maheu, “Horizon” invites Houstonians to take a seat inside these domed art structures and contemplate the sculpted skies. Gently rocking the chairs within the pieces will trigger a series of light and soundscapes.

Houston First Corporation has partnered with international public art producers Creos and Init to present Horizon with the hope it gives Houstonians and all the national and international visitors we’ve had this summer to slow down, unwind, and enjoy one of our favorite community spaces.

“George Washington: America's Enduring Icon” at Bayou Bend (now through November 22)
The MFAH celebrates America's first president with this fascinating decorative art exhibition at its Bayou Bend house museum. “Enduring Icon” includes objects from the 18th, 19th, and 20th centuries featuring images of George Washington during his lifetime, as well as many that mourned or honored him after his death. The exhibition examines the many ways that Americans have recognized, honored, celebrated, memorialized, and appropriated Washington as both a man and icon.

“America 250” at the Museum of Fine Arts, Houston (now through January 3)
The 4th of July might have passed, but Houstonians and visitors from around the world can continue to celebrate the United States’ 250th birthday by taking this special marked journey through the MFAH. Instead of a contained exhibition, museum curators have chosen over 70 artworks from the collection across the campus to tell a uniquely American story through art.

From golden antiquities to Native American pottery to vast painted landscapes to large-scale installations of futuristic cities, these pieces reflect the complexity and diversity of the American experience, while drawing connections between our nation and the MFAH's history as a collecting institution. As visitors explore the museum, indoors and out, they’ll find guides to the artworks, along with newly created audio stops and labels that discuss each artwork from these historical and cultural perspectives.

"On the occasion of the nation’s 250th anniversary, we saw a singular opportunity to look at our collections and select objects that reflect the multitudes of individuals who have contributed to the identity of our nation,” describes MFAH director, Gary Tinterow. “The curators’ choices will allow our visitors to experience our collections framed within a series of illuminating and sometimes surprising narratives.”

"Representation of Form" at MATCH (July 9-12)
Photography and choreography dance together as Group Accord and photographer Christopher Peddecord collaborate in the creation of this multidisciplinary art event. Peddecord has taken photographs of Group Acorde dance artists and layers the images with one another. Those photographs will then be displayed and projected throughout the MATCH Box 1 space. During live performances, the dancers will move within the images of themselves. Audiences will also be free to move about the space, immersing themselves within the installation.

“Casa de Cultura: The Living Archive” at the Fresh Arts Gallery in Winter Street Studios (July 9-August 22)
Fresh Arts’ ongoing Space Taking Artist Residency invites traditionally underrepresented local artists to experiment and “take over” Fresh Arts’ gallery space at Sawyer Yards. The initiative has produced some stunning and surprising artwork and live performance experiences over the past few years.

For “Casa de Cultura,” Violeta Alvarez, an award-winning local photographer, will present work inspired by her mother’s life and journeys. Alvarez will create a “Living Archive” exploring cultural identity, migration and collective memory. The project will feature two photography exhibitions: one a curated selection of Alvarez’s music photography, including her early work with Justice Records, and the second built entirely from open-call live portrait sessions of individuals with ancestral ties to Mesoamerica. Several live events and performances will take place throughout the residency, including community photo sessions, panel discussions, a podcast recording, Aztec dance performances, Chicanx artist vendors for Second Saturdays, and community drives.

"World of Color” at Laura Rathe Fine Art (July 16-August 14)
This exhibition brings together a group of artists working in different mediums and producing very distinct imagery, but all their art explores vivid colors and manifests a sense of wonder and play. "World of Color" explores color as both a meaningful and nostalgic force, brought to life through Miriam Fitzgerald’s intricately folded paper, Gian Garofalo’s flowing stripes of pigmented resin, Pablo Dona’s miniature figures swimming within teacups, and Lynn Sanders' layered colorscapes. Exhibition organizers note that through curious and intuitive explorations of color, each artist engages with combinations that create a childlike sense of discovery.

"Learning Curve 18” at Houston Center for Photography (July 16-August 16)
This annual exhibition celebrates the HCP students’ work over a given year, and for the 18th iteration, the exhibition will showcase students from various programs at the Center doing a range of photographic work from digital to alternative processes. Jessi Bowman, the Houston-based photographer, curator, and founder of FLATS, a community darkroom and photo lab, is this year’s juror. Bowman has intentionally selected pieces exploring photography from a multitude of approaches, subjects, and perspectives in order to create an show that reveals artists working in community.

“As a juror, I was drawn to work that embraced curiosity and possibility. The strongest images often reflected a willingness to take risks,” explains Bowman in a statement about the selections, adding “Many of these photographs show artists pushing beyond technical proficiency toward a more personal visual voice.”

Photo courtesy of Art Club

Orkhan Mammadov’s “Visions” at Art Club