Issue link: http://papercitymagazine.uberflip.com/i/1513369
OBSESSIONS. DECORATION. SALIENT FACTS. Art NOTES By Catherine D. Anspon T he Arc of History: Holocaust Museum Houston welcomes one of the seminal troves of African American art, artifacts, and historical ephemera — a stop on a national tour that has been seen by 16 million people in museums and history centers worldwide, including the Smithsonian's National Museum of American History. The Kinsey Collection spans five centuries, 1595 onward, encompassing artworks by Ernie Barnes, Charles Alston, Elizabeth Catlett, Alma Thomas, Hughie Lee-Smith, and Houston's Ava Cosey; bills of sale from the slave trade; Civil War tintypes; Harlem Renaissance literature; and Civil Rights materials including documents from the Woolworth store boycotts and the 1963 March on Washington, D.C. (January 12 – June 23). Read our interview with collection founders Shirley and Bernard Kinsey and their son, chief curator Khalil Kinsey, upcoming at papercitymag.com. American Hero: A memorial commissioned by POST Houston has just been dedicated to one of the country's most inspiring stateswomen, the late Barbara Jordan. The artist is Houston's Angelbert Metoyer, best known for his symbol-laden paintings, which will be featured in an upcoming monograph edited by Rice University professor Dr. Anthony Pinn examining Metoyer's practice as it aligns with Afro Futurism. At the POST plaza, the new monument honors Jordan with a bronze sculpted in her likeness, holding the Constitution. The Fifth Ward-raised daughter of a Baptist minister and church teacher, Jordan graduated from Wheatley High and TSU, where she launched her speaking career on the university's famed debate team. After earning her law degree from Boston University and returning to Houston, she was elected in 1972 to the U.S. House of Representatives, becoming the first African- American woman from the South to serve in Congress. Metoyer's work reveals his prowess in traditional bronze sculpture, a medium that rarely memorializes the accomplishments of a woman. F r e e d m e n ' s Town Revival: At the Contemporary Arts Museum Houston, the concisely titled "This Way: A Houston Group S h o w " d o e s n o t h i n t a t t h e r i c h e s it contains. Organized by curator Mich S t e v e n s o n , the exhibition digs deep into lost histories and newly excavated legacies of one of America's first p o s t - E m a n c i p a t i o n communities, Houston Freedmen's Town, founded 1865. Tapping a dozen artists who dialogue with members of the historic Black neighborhood and research fellows, Stevenson has brought an unforgettable elegy to a place that is conjured anew by "This Way." Highlights include fifth-generation Freedmen's Town activist Charonda Johnson's ode to the early-20th-century De-Ro-Loc Carnival and Flash Gordon Parks' recreation of the Ebony Bar, down to the music Mecca's storied jukebox (through March 24). Remarkable Retrospective: Venice Biennale-exhibited, Texas-born James Drake returns to solo at Moody Gallery. His exhibition, "The Heart Has Many Rivers (for Carmen)," can only be described as epic. It features drawings spanning 61 years — works that poetically and powerfully probe the physical and metaphoric idea of the border (January 13 – February 24). Turmoil of Tyranny: Cuban émigré Reynier Leyva Novo — who captured the 2022 Armory Show $25,000 Pommery Prize — makes his U.S. museum solo debut at the Blaffer Art Museum in an exhibition co-organized by Steven Matijcio and Erika Mei Chua Holum. The conceptual artist's work is matched to our Presidential-election-cycle year; Novo skewers propaganda, dictatorship, and political duplicity (January 12 – March 10). Ava Cosey's Ancestor's Torch, 2011, at Holocaust Museum Houston THE KINSEY AFRICAN AMERICAN ART & HISTORY COLLECTION (Art Notes continued on page 66) Katherine Warren, J.D. BROKER BROKER ASSO ASSOCIATE® CIATE® Circle of Excellence Member, Hall of Fame Circle of Excellence Member, Hall of Fame 832.725.4340 CONGRATULATIONS Your trusted real estate professional is now a LICENSED BROKER. 16