Issue link: http://papercitymagazine.uberflip.com/i/184605
THE IDYLLS OF IDYLWOOD INSIDE THE ART NEST OF PHOTOGRAPHER, COLLAGIST, FEMINIST, CRAFTSMAN, COLLABORATOR, FERVID COLLECTOR OF OBJETS TROUVÉS, MEMOIRIST, NATURALIST, GARDENER AND BLOGGER MARY MARGARET HANSEN. SHE AND BEAU, PAINTER EARL STALEY, CALL THE EAST SIDE HOME. CATHERINE D. ANSPON STEPS INSIDE. PHOTOGRAPHY JENNY ANTILL. F rom the Fifth Ward to Montrose, plus a heaping helping of the Houston Heights, we've covered artists' domiciles and the studios where inspiration strikes. But not until recently were we smitten with the East Side of Houston — an attraction that began the moment we entered the romantic and fiercely independent kingdom of Mary Margaret Hansen. (One of my favorite days ever in the art world was a Sunday brunch I shared with Hansen and her larger-than-life romantic lead, grand master Texas painter Earl Staley, plus their charming long-time pals Margaret and H.J. Bott.) Peruse these pages for clues to the multifaceted three-decade career of this engaging home's owner, evidence of the trails she's blazed and the fellow artists she's mentored, and a new tableau vivant, forming now, as Staley shares her domestic bliss. The stage where all the action takes place? A handsome 1948 bungalow in the revitalized neighborhood of Idylwood, complete with a pleasingly unruly garden that meanders to a heavily treed ravine, giving cover to all manner of avians and fauna, as well as a studio with an old-timey screen porch, its cozy interior formerly the garage. Now, enter the Hansen household. This wall in Hansen's studio proclaims her obsession with a personal search. The self-portrait on the right dates from 1980 to 1981. The corrugated green sheet-metal walls were salvaged from the warehouse of friend/fellow East End civic leader Mike Garver. In a second bedroom, files groan with evidence of a life lived behind the camera; Hansen estimates her archives hold "thousands of negatives." Front and center is the Walzflex camera with coveted Zeiss lens that launched it all — a gift from her father, a Standard Oil executive, when she was nine years old and the family lived in Aruba. (He was a director of the oil company's private school system, while her mother was a singer, conductor of choral music, writer and role model.) Now rusted after constant exposure to saltwater, the Walzflex led to photographic study at Cornell, and then prompted her later to co-found the Houston Center for Photography. LAURIE PEREZ The studio, completed in 2008, displays Hansen's photographic collages, including a discarded Hurricane Ike faux tapestry with images of Jell-O salad molds applied to it — an example of the artist's sense of whimsy. She's as enthralled by fabric, hangings and coverlets as she is about photography. The sunflower in the needlepoint chair is a metaphor for the improving fortunes of the area. "Every new day in Houston begins in the East End," she proclaimed to the Greater East End Management District at their annual luncheon (she was district president from 2000 to 2007). The screen porch that shades the studio serves as a retreat for Hansen and Staley to read, write, sketch and quaff morning coffee or end-of-day wine. The pair reconnected at a DiverseWorks Gala that honored Staley after an interval of not seeing each other for 20 years. Both artists are ensconced in new endeavors. Hansen is formulating her next collaborative/conceptual adventure after directing, selecting and overseeing the entire public art project for the City of Houston's Central Permitting and Green Resource Center, administered through the Houston Arts Alliance, last year. Staley, who has just joined the stable of New Gallery/Thom Andriola, will headline there this month in his first major Houston solo since his return from New Mexico. In the kitchen windowsill, pottery cupcakes by San Francisco ceramic artist Sharon Virtue take on an architectural quality; they're from the wedding of Hansen's eldest daughter, Caroline. At their base, miniature plastic quinceañera dolls parade like a convocation of little women. This grouping inspired Hansen's 2005 exhibition "La Folie Innocente du Coeur" at the International Woman's Foundation in Marfa. A big Mexican jug has pride of place in the well-tomed library. In the foreground, an oyster dish scored from the Guild Shop. Hansen's parents gave her the gift of the library for her housewarming: they paid for the shelving and hired the contractor. The library was previously the dining room of the bungalow. In a coincidence of synchronicity, the home was designed by an empowered woman of a different time: Mrs. D.C. Teer, an amateur architect/mother of three girls/housewife who, back in the day, "drew her own house plans and then spent eight hours a day supervising construction work," as reported by the Houston Chronicle. This comfortable middle-class postwar dwelling was built in 1948 for $20,000. Forty-five years later, Hansen, by then divorced and also a mother of three girls, bought the Teer house and became its second owner.