From 1950 to 1980, Houston became the titular capital of modern art in Texas, attracting a loose-knit colony of important painters nurtured in a burgeoning community of avant-garde galleries, collectors, museums and university art departments. Looking back, it is evident now that this 30-year span represented one of the most vital and productive periods of the city's cultural evolution, a coming-of-age of the Houston art scene that paralleled the region's dramatic rise in population, economic influence and social vitality.

Bayou City Chic examines this watershed era by presenting a survey of paintings by artists associated with the city's mid-century journey, as well as an interesting sampler of works by Texas modernists of the period whose output interfaced with that of the Houston scene.

The exhibition captures the energy and innovation of an important period and offers a visual treatise of the natural progressions of Houston art at a time that may now be heralded as the high-water point of a century past.

Artists featured include David Adickes, Gertrude Barnstone, John Biggers, Harvey Bott, Jack Boynton, David Brownlow, Lowell Collins, Bill Condon, Ben Culwell, Don Edelman, Seymour Fogel, Michael Frary, Frank Freed, Henri Gadbois, John Guerin, Dorothy Hood, Perry House, Otis Huband, Ibsen Espada, Lucas Johnson, Ken Luce, Leila McConnell, Herb Mears, Robert Morris, Margaret Putnam, Bill Reily, Robert Rogan, Charles Schorre, Chester Snowden, Earl Staley, Richard Stout, Stella Sullivan, McKie Trotter, Arthur Turner and Dick Wray.

On view through March 8.