Issue link: http://papercitymagazine.uberflip.com/i/1468548
A transformative project — Rice University's radical reinvention of midtown's Deco-era Sears building into a hub for tech innovation and ideas — brings with it a side of public art. Cue the Ion and its inaugural EyeOnArt program, overseen by public-art advocate Piper Faust. Houston talents Lina Dib and Preston Gaines, with their respective practices of anthropology and architecture, were selected by the Ion and the Ion District Art Advisory Council from more than 60 submissions to create site- specific installations for the former department store's windows. See the results for the next four months, 24/7. Nature is celebrated in each artist's commission, dialoguing as well as with the neighborhood, which will soon be flocking to the Ion as a new food destination, come late summer/early fall. Faust praises Dib's and Gaines' IMAGE AND WORK COURTESY PRIVATE COLLECTION AND ROBERTS PROJECTS, L..A.. PHOTO ROBERT WEDEMEYER. MEMORIAL CLOSE IN | 9201 WICKFORD DRIVE 5-6 BR | 6.5+BA | $6.5M w w w . j a y m o n r o e h o u s t o n . c o m Jay Monroe, BROKER ASSOCIATE , BROKER ASSOCIATE Circle of Excellence Member, Hall of Fame Circle of Excellence Member, Hall of Fame 713.504.6936 713.504.6936 Jay.Monroe@sir.com Jay.Monroe@sir.com NEW LISTING SEARS BECOMES KUNSTHALLE ART NOTES C oup for CAMH: The much anticipated "Amoako Boafo: Soul of BlackFolks" arrives at Contemporary Arts Museum Houston, co-organized by the Museum of the African Diaspora, San Francisco, where the show unveiled last October. The exhibition marks the artist's museum debut, as well as a site-specific mural created for Houston. Boafo, who lives between Ghana, his birthplace, and Vienna, is one of the most prescient contemporary painters, as well as an windows for being "contemplative, imaginative, and thought-provoking. I'm thrilled for their works to be displayed at the Ion, a place that is unwavering in its support for all types of entrepreneurs, including creatives such as themselves." Through September 2022, ionhouston.com. Catherine D. Anspon art-market wunderkind. The painter's figurative canvases celebrate the dignity and joy of his black subjects and regularly achieve seven figures at global auctions. Ghana-American cultural critic Larry Ossei-Mensah, co-founder of the nonprofit ArtNoir, guest-curates (through October 2). Identity in the Lens: At Houston Museum of African American Culture, guest curator/writer Lise Ragbir organizes an exhibition for Dallas OBSESSIONS. DECORATION. SALIENT FACTS. photographer Hakeem Adewumi, who balances his mother's Black American culture with his father's Nigerian heritage. In this solo, "Bastard of the Diaspora," Adewumi's portraits examine mutable iterations of identity — specifically, his lens focuses on black queerness, the first time works by a queer artist have graced HMAAC's walls, says museum CEO John Guess Jr. (through June 15). Catherine D. Anspon ALEX MONTOYA 16 Amoako Boafo's Black and White, 2018, at CAMH Preston Gaines' Fantasy Landscape, 2022, at the Ion