Melany Jean’s Top 10 Fine Art Moments of 2018
Unforgettably textured sculptures, unsettling exhibitions, and unusual spaces made for a memorable year in art
Melany Jean
1-30 of 60 entries
Arts, Dec. 27, 2018
"Annie Miller: I see london, I see france" at MoHA
This show in the Cage Match Project series casts the viewer as peeping Tom, looking through holes in a boarded-up trailer to view art
Arts, Nov. 29, 2018
MASS Gallery's "Staycation: thresholds"
The gallery's first exhibit in its new home invites viewers into the private self and into the stretching of one's limits
Arts, Nov. 15, 2018
East Austin Studio Tour 2018: Recapping Weekend 1
Take MoHA's selfie challenge? Bathe in the forest? Do it all!
Arts, Nov. 14, 2018
Immersive, Interactive, Intriguing EAST
Melany Jean's five recommended stops for the East Austin Studio Tour 2018
Arts, Nov. 8, 2018
"Steve Parker: War Tuba" at Big Medium
In exploring sound's relationship to conflict and use in it, the artist fuses past and present, melody and discord, into a remixed reveille
Arts, Nov. 8, 2018
ICOSA's "Chiaroscuro: probing mystery, seeking clarity"
The first group show in the collective's new home shows its members stretching themselves and embracing change
Arts, Nov. 1, 2018
“Shanie Tommasini: Slippery Clump” at the Umlauf
The Umlauf Prize-winning artist uses big, playful shapes and environmental manipulation to look at art, nature, and conservation
Arts, Oct. 25, 2018
"Ed Ruscha: Archaeology and Romance" at the Ransom Center
This evocative excavation into the artist's process of creating art and making books reveals the work of art is the completed book itself
Arts, Oct. 18, 2018
“Ana Esteve Llorens: Correspondence” at Las Cruxes
The textiles in this solo show map a negotiation between the weaver and her surroundings, a lattice charting stretch and slack over time
Arts, Oct. 11, 2018
"Shawn Camp: Equivocation" at Northern-Southern
In this three-part installation, the artist plays with light to creates work that is atmospheric and at times beautifully contemplative
Arts, Oct. 4, 2018
"Matt Rebholz and Rachel Wolfson Smith: We Can See Through Time" at ICOSA
Drawings in red and blue ink, intended to be viewed through 3-D glasses, pull the viewer in to landscapes that make the familiar look alien
Arts, Sept. 27, 2018
"Ann Wood: Quick and Quiet" at Big Medium
The artist's solo show is like a large-scale, experiential temporary memorial, with fake flowers rotting in a gloomy exuberance
Arts, Sept. 20, 2018
"Vincent Valdez: The City" at the Blanton
The artist's epic portrait of Klanspeople is all the more frightening for the mundane character of its subjects
Arts, Sept. 13, 2018
"ANGRY CLOUD + DESCND: Return of the Litvak"
The clouds are angry in this solo installation, but the spirit of the show is doggedly hopeful, fresh, and invigorating
Arts, Sept. 6, 2018
"The Indigo Show" at Recspec Gallery
This group show is appealing for the ways in which it showcases this most intense, moody, serene, and opulent of all the blues
Arts, Aug. 30, 2018
Review: "Young Latinx Artists 23"
This year's group show at Mexic-Arte shows the border as scar
Arts, Aug. 3, 2018
"Xavier Schipani: Chasing Desire" at Lora Reynolds Gallery
The artist probes the history and crisis of masculinity by placing beefy men in salacious tangles, exposed and unashamed
Arts, Aug. 2, 2018
"Margaux Crump: The Lure" at Women & Their Work
Juxtaposing natural and synthetic materials through the metaphor of the hunt, the artist blurs lines between lust and danger, the repellent and the seductive
Arts, July 19, 2018
"Jonathan Muzacz: Stained Slabs" at the Butridge
With his solo show, the artist revs up the gallery by bringing in the street in eye-catching style
Arts, July 12, 2018
"...of Warp and Weft" at Davis Gallery
Using wood and cheesecloth, Caprice Pierucci and Charles Heppner's mutation of form and fiber is beautiful even as it is foreboding
Arts, July 12, 2018
“Regional Fictions” at MASS Gallery
This thought-provoking show takes on the educational system's traditional narratives by juxtaposing the familiar with images that challenge it
Arts, June 28, 2018
“Michael Anthony García: Continental Divide” at St. Edward’s
Layered photographs and images of empty garments across Austin allude to spaces of equality and disruption
Arts, June 7, 2018
"Krista Steinke: Good Luck With the Sun" at W&TW
These spectacular images of the sun and sky captured with homemade pinhole cameras reveal more about us than celestial objects
Arts, May 31, 2018
Object Collection’s It's All True
This opera culled from Fugazi concert detritus was an endurance test for both audience and performers
Arts, May 24, 2018
WEST Pop-Up at the Neill-Cochran House Museum
For the West Austin Studio Tour, 15 artists show their work in this historic Austin home to varying and delightful effect
Arts, May 17, 2018
Phillip Wade at West Austin Studio Tour
The artist has some creative friends show in his Clarksville home
Arts, May 10, 2018
"Dawn Okoro: Punk Noir" at the Carver Museum
The artist provides a corrective to preconceived notions of punk, exploring the ethos through black personal style
Arts, May 10, 2018
“Elizabeth Chiles: Weave” at grayDUCK Gallery
Chiles explores the ever-changing nature of light, time, and life through transcendant prints of light’s little dance through flora
Arts, May 3, 2018
"Spencer Fidler: Vasculum" at Flatbed
This solo show reveals the artist's daily practice of preservation of craft and creativity
