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Art & Parks Tour
This sweet opportunity comes to us from the Downtown Austin Alliance, the Pease Park Conservancy, and Ride Bikes Austin – so we know it's a damned good thing indeed. Take the self-guided Art & Parks Tour to explore the best of what Downtown Austin art and parks have to offer through this selection of curated murals, artworks, and green spaces. You can sign up anytime, so click that URL and get ready to learn the most vibrantly visual parts of your city soon – live and in person. -
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Landmarks: Self-Guided Walking Tour
Use your smartphone to access self-guided tours of the outdoor public art sited by UT's award-winning Landmarks program any time you feel like it. BONUS: There's also a free, docent-led tour starting at Marc Quinn's "Spiral of the Galaxy" (1501 Red River) on Sun., Jan. 8, 11am.
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“Identity Exchange”
Here’s a show featuring works by intergenerational trans Texan artists, each one influenced by pre-show discussions “on their identity, what it means to be true to yourself, and what trans people living in Texas today need.” Opening night promises drinks, snacks, activities, and a performance by show artist Sir Beauregard Elliot.Fri., April 4, 6pmUpfront Gallery, 1023 Springdale Bldg 3
OPENING
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Third Annual San Marcos Studio Tour
With the fate of fall’s Austin Studio Tour uncertain, now’s a good time to push your chips in with San Marcos. The brainchild of MotherShip Studios, an industrial warehouse park turned gallery and studio space founded in 2020 by Courtney Peterson and Jacqueline Overby, the San Marcos Studio Tour will showcase 87 local artists – many operating out of home base MotherShip, a few gently testing the San Marcos city limits to include neighboring Lockhart. Friday’s free kickoff party provides an early look at the art, plus live music and libations (open to the public, but RSVP online), while the rest of SMST – now expanded to two weekends – unfurls at your pace noon-6pm, Saturday & Sunday. – Kimberley JonesApril 4-6 & 12-13Locations across San Marcos
ONGOING
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Visual Arts
Jiab Prachakul: Sweet Solitude
Whoever says Austin isn’t a fine art town can get the hell out of here. We continually break artistic ground with innovative and international taste. The Contemporary once again adds to that rep by hosting artist Jiab Prachakul’s first solo museum show. Born in Thailand, living in France, and with a solid film background behind her, Prachakul’s work has a bold style and clear point of view. Heavy graphic lines and soul-stirring colors fill her art. Each moment could be a film still, each stroke staking her claim on a far-too-Western art world. Widely accessible but intensely intimate, Prachakul’s scenes beg for close inspection. Join the Contemporary, and the artist herself, in examining her offerings during Friday’s opening night festivities or in conversation on Saturday, Feb. 1. – Cat McCarreyThrough August 3 -
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Laguna Gloria
This local treasure of a venue, run by those Contemporary Austin folks who also bring us the Jones Center shows Downtown, is all about the outdoors – which is perfect for these trickily navigated times of ours, n'est-ce pas? Recommended: Stop by and breathe in the air, enjoy the lawns and gardens and the many examples of world-class sculpture arrayed across the property, and (as Frankie used to say) r-e-l-a-x.Thu.-Fri., 9am-noon; Sat.-Sun., 9am-3pm -
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Martha's Contemporary: Hokey Pokey + What You See Is What You Get
Here's a two-person exhibition that features painting, installation, videography, and sculpture by Moll Brau and Wes Thompson. It's a deep dive into a pool of loneliness, triumph, and rebirth. It's a forest of mazes where fireflies provide the light. It's a show of creations from a pair of terrific, hardworking local artists and you don't want to miss it. -
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Museum of Illusions
Enter the fascinating world of illusions in this new venue that boasts a stunning array of intriguing visual, sensory, and educational experiences among new, unexplored optical wonderments.$20-24.11010 Domain #100 -
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Old Bakery Gallery: Fantastical Flora
This multimedia exhibition is a comprehensive exploration of the beauty of botanical forms, expressed realistically and in the abstract, featuring the work of local artist Francine Funke.Opening reception: Sat., Jan. 20, 1-4pm. Free. -
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Visual Arts
Ranran Fan: “Inhale the Interruption 动弹”
Described in their about-the-artist as a “device-maker,” current new media art assistant professor at University of North Texas Ranran Fan digs into time-telling with their latest exhibition. Opening Saturday, March 22, this three-part installation features an ongoing incense burning – recalling the Chinese cultural association of incense with time measurement and memory. Exhibition attendees are invited to share their response to the scents and sensations to a chatbot trained on Fan’s personal writings, which will speak out its own replies. Also on display will be automated time-tracking sculptures, interactive video projections, and an outdoor sundial sculpture – all of which Women & Their Work says “explores the passage of time and the potential for healing.” – James ScottThrough May 8 -
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Sara Jane Parsons: “Project Pollination”
Tales of dwindling bee populations are guaranteed to send me into an existential panic. Which is why I fully embrace any reminder of pollinators’ goodness, purity, and beauty – especially when those reminders are as lovely as Sara Jane Parsons’ watercolor works. For her latest exhibit, “Project Pollination,” Parsons pairs portraits of her food and their pollinator pals. Luscious fruits and vegetables hang near moths and bees on the wing. The figures glow with life, becoming all the more impressive when you learn Parsons mouthpaints, as she’s paralyzed from the neck down. It’s a process of persistence and environmental preservation. The paintings are viewable for the next month, but get a more personal view at the Wednesday, March 19, opening. – Cat McCarreyThrough April 19; opening reception on March 19 -
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Stephen L. Clark Gallery: Kate Breakey
This exhibition of new work by Kate Breakey showcases hand-colored photography of the natural world, particularly of Texan and Australian landscapes, animals, and insects. -
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The Museum of Natural & Artificial Ephemerata
This place, ah, it's one of our favorite places in the entire city; and of course they're properly corona-closed. But check 'em out online right now – it's a rich, wonder-filled website – to whet your appetite for when things get back to … uh … are we still calling it "normal," these days? -
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Words and Wonder: Rediscovering Children’s Literature
One of the pleasures of having a first-rate research center and archive in town is how the Harry Ransom Center will regularly comb through its own vast holdings and hand-pick gems to present in a new context. Hence the HRC’s latest exhibit, “Words and Wonder: Rediscovering Children’s Literature,” which pulls from its manuscript, art, photography, film, and performing arts holdings to spotlight early 20th-century authors and illustrators catering to a young readership. The exhibit includes magic lantern slides from Aesop’s Fables, John Tenniel’s illustrations of Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland, and Ernest H. Shepard’s indelible images from the Hundred Acre Wood, among other treats. Runs through August 17. – Kimberley JonesThrough August 17 -
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Wyld Gallery
This is Ray Donley's gallery of art by Native Americans, located in that company of artistic glory called Canopy and resplendent with creations from the original people of our struggling country.Call for appointment -
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Yard Dog: Paul Rodriguez
Yard Dog presents the vibrant works of Paul Rodriguez, a printmaker from San Miguel de Allende. "And some very cool new paintings by Harry Underwood."Opening reception: Fri., Jan. 19, 7-9pm -
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“Lacquer Panique” Paintings by Denise Prince
Oil of Olay? No: Oil on canvas, painted by second-time solo Ivester Contemporary exhibitionist Denise Prince as part of her new show kicking off this Saturday, March 1. These works dig into our current relationship to beauty as seen through product advertisements – you know, the big glossy images scattered throughout fashion mags you read in a salon waiting room – and test those visual limits. How beautiful can a flower remain through the process of abstraction? Are the colors, the softness, the mere hint of shiny jewels enough to satisfy the human desire for aesthetics? You’ve got until the show closes on April 5 to make your call. – James ScottThrough April 5 -
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“Transcendence: A Century of Black Queer Ecstasy, 1924-2024”
Across politics and pop culture, depictions of queer Black life most often emphasize pain, if not patronization. “Transcendence: A Century of Black Queer Ecstasy,” a multimedia exhibition presented by UT-Austin’s Art Galleries at Black Studies, flips the script, offering a century’s worth of works that focus instead on Black joy. Organized around seven themes – Portraiture, Beyond Figuration, Dance and Movement, Spirituality, Sex and Sensuality, Black Queer Futures, and Altered States – the works of over four dozen artists remind us that even in the face of adversity, we can achieve transcendence. – Carys AndersonThrough May 9Christian-Green Gallery, 201 E. 21st St. & Idea Lab, 210 W. 24th St.
Creative Opportunities
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Atelier Dojo: Remote Studios
The local powerhouse of figurative painting, the art school that's the smart school for artists of all kinds, they've got a painting-along-at-home series going to help you keep your skills honed in these socially restrictive times, featuring live costumed models posing on camera and a thriving community of creatives rendering that lovely human biotecture from their separate studios. "Join us for a three-hour costumed-model drawing session. Use any supplies you wish, listen to music, share your work, chat with others. It’s a great way to stay connected with your art community!"Tuesdays, 1:30-4:30pm; Fridays, 6:30-9:30pm; Saturdays, 9:30-12:30pm. $5.