Issue link: http://papercitymagazine.uberflip.com/i/1544028
F otoFest Ascendant: There's one word for FotoFest Biennial 2026, which continues this month: epic. I was overwhelmed, strolling through the vast halls of Silver Street Studios the day after the grand opening for the 40th anniversary of America's first and foremost showcase of global photography. Next, I joined a tour of the adjoining Winter Street Studios, led by the curators, co-founder/ original artistic director Wendy Watriss and executive director Steven Evans, with co-curators Annick Dekiouk and Madi Murphy in tow. Together, these sprawling spaces offer a distillation of 20 FotoFests to date — no easy task, considering 7,400 artists and 16,000 works have been exhibited. The resulting exhibition, cogently organized by each biennial and theme, amounts to a lively, moving, and powerful testimony to the medium of our time. Its expansive focus also digs deeply into contributions from other regions of the planet — in recent memory, Africa, India, Russia, China, and the Arab World. As with the de Menils — whom founders/award-winning photojournalists Wendy Watriss and the late Fred Baldwin admired and credit with their settling in Houston — activism is part of the equation. Social justice, planetary concerns, Earth, and water have all been past themes. Round out your heroic FotoFest viewing at The Silos at Sawyer Yards where "Discoveries of the Meeting Place + Ten By Ten" holds court (through May 10). Be sure to take in the cornucopia of FotoFest-related exhibitions at participating spaces. Recommended: The uncanny and singular world of Houston's Emily Peacock in "Babycakes" at Seven Sisters emits a sense of domestic unease. Peacock's deadpan yet startling images are laced with wry humor (through April 25) … "The Vanguard" at Houston Center for Photography, curated by executive director Anne Leighton Massoni on the occasion of the nonprofit's 45th anniversary, salutes 20 women who started it all, both for HCP and Massoni's own journey in the photography world including fearless feminist collaborators Mary Margaret Hansen and the late Patsy Cravens (through May 24). While you're there, catch Brazilian lens lady Luisa Dörr's documentary series on Bolivian femmes' skate culture in "Rebel Girl," paired with Jo Ann Chaus and Selina Román (through May 24) and Jamie Robertson's spectral infra- r e d s w a m p scenes, in "soft heat" (through April 12) … At newly minted micro gallery Reissued Studios, in a preserved, under-the-radar mid- century office complex at 4916 Kelvin, the great Robert L. Hodge curates Tempest Williams' intuitive collage and assemblage in "No Church in the Wild" (through June 6) … Houston's collage queen/MFAH- exhibited Kaima Marie Akarue returns from a prized Black Rock Senegal residency to present "Under the Atlantic Veil" at Jonathan Hopson Gallery (through May 31). Find more on FotoFest's participating spaces at papercitymag.com. Seeing Gold: Wimberley-based McKay Otto's latest, a melding of painting and sculpture enveloped in diaphanous translucent panels, unveils in "Gold Show" at Heidi Vaughan Fine Art. Mentored by the late Agnes Martin, Otto's work always edges towards the transcendental (April 18 – May 9). Catherine D. Anspon Clockwise from top: Emily Peacock, I Run My Mouth Off, 2025, at Seven Sisters. Kaima Marie Akarue, Threshold Record, Dakar, Senegal, 2025, at Jonathan Hopson Gallery. McKay Otto, Seven Points of View, 2025, at Heidi Vaughan Fine Art. Art Notes 44