Leaving an Artistic Mark on Her City

Diana Kersey is a potter in San Antonio who, in 2009, was awarded a Public Art Commission in the City of San Antonio to design, build, and install ceramic panels for the Mulberry Avenue and Millrace Bridges as part of a drainage project at Brackenridge Park.

The city wanted her to depict the health of waterways. When the public were consulted about the Mulberry Bridge, they wanted a landmark, something distinctive. Diana took both those requests, linked water health with the health of amphibians, chose the local Gulf Coast Toad, and created 24 hand-crafted ceramic panels — most of them 2 feet by 6 feet, about 208 square feet of fired clay in all — on both sides of the bridge's two guardrails, telling the toad's life story.

Image above: Diana Kersey drew from the connections among the bridge, water and animal life for her first public art project, the Mulberry Avenue Bridge. STEVE BENNETT / EXPRESS-NEWS

See images of this project.

Read Steve Bennett's article in the San Antonio Express from June 23, 2011.

Installation Art at Rice University

Houston’s famous Rice University has an extensive art department and an art gallery as well. The gallery is "The only university art museum in the nation dedicated to site-specific installation art[.] Rice Gallery presents temporary, large-scale environments that visitors can enter and explore. Artists typically use inexpensive materials to create stunning works of art."

The next exhibition, by Mexican-American Ana Serrano, will open on September 29th. You are invited. The opening is free (parking, however is not!); it's from 5-7 p.m. on Thursday, September 29th, and the artist will be there to give a talk and mingle with visitors. The gallery is located at 6100 Main Street, in 352 Sewall Hall. Here's a phone number: 713-348-6069.

Ana Serrano "Notices the parts of the urban landscape that most of us ignore...She creates small sculptures of buildings that cull together what might catch her eye on a morning walk: the hand-painted signage and illustrations on a local business, the blue and turquoise colors of a house with the cord of a satellite dish snaking down the side, or an auto parts shop adjoining a pink and yellow piñata store.

In Salon of Beauty, Ana Serrano will enlarge these details in a cityscape of buildings that playfully mix together her observations of the unexpected and ephemeral nature of a city constantly being made and unmade by its residents." 

See more of her work at http://www.ricegallery.org/new/exhibition/serrano.html

Cody Hooper: Abstract artist

When I viewed the website gallery of San Antonio abstract artist Cody Hooper, I found myself thinking of him as a southwestern Piet Mondrian. This talented emerging artist experiments with the glowing effects of layers of glazes. He also exhibits a brilliant sense of proportion. Lovely, evocative, beautifully composed abstract compositions. Just wanted to share him with you...

MARSHALL HARRIS: Welcome to my Sight

When my husband introduced me to his old classmate from Southwest High in Fort Worth, I had no doubt that he'd gone on to become a professional football player. Marshall Harris stands somewhere midway between six and seven feet tall and has the physique of a linebacker.

His art is equally distinctive. He creates architectural welded sculptures, installations, and amazing drawings. Marshall just finished his MFA and also just returned to living in Fort Worth. His drawings include nudes, but I think you'll find them unusual, in that Marshall "seeks the deeper underlying sub-context of people, places, and situations." Not too many artists draw middle-aged men...Here's a link to his website

Woody Gwyn

Woody Gwyn, southwestern landscape and figure painter par excellence, believes that landscape painting is a figment of its time. His contemporary paintings often contain highways because that's how we moderns get out into the countryside to see the landscape. Born in San Antonio, raised in west Texas; he used to teach at Texas Tech. I believe he now lives in Alburquerque. Here's his website (from which the image left, an oil on linen called "Road Cut", is copied): www.woodygwyn.com/ Peter Sacks wrote a book about him called Woody Gwyn; I'd be happy to order it for you by interlibrary loan. If you go to http://www.hcpl.net/and click on the Books tab, you'll see the Interlibrary Loan page on the drop-down menu.