Issue link: http://papercitymagazine.uberflip.com/i/439445
Year of the Chin: Ring it all in with an ambitious, unprecedented 40-year retrospective devoted to Houston native son Mel Chin, shared by four museums: Blaffer Art Museum in the lead, with Asia Society Texas Center, Contemporary Arts Museum Houston and Station Museum of Contemporary Art (where Jim Harithas has long been the artist's champion). January 17 is the big opening around town, where you'll see works such as Chin's encyclopedia room culled from cutout Funk & Wagnalls (more deets, rematchhouston.com) … Art League Houston also gets into the action, mounting Chin's drawings (January 16 – February 21). Concurrent with Chin, check out a survey by notable Houston sculptor Ed Wilson that's well-timed. Read on. Painter's Progress: UH MFA grad Bradley Kerl makes a remarkable debut at Art Palace in his first significant solo. Abstractions loosely based upon room vignettes signal an important new Houston painter (January 9 – February 14). We're for Ed: In our close-knit community, controversy rarely erupts. When it does, it's a challenge (we all remember the tree incident). The latest fervor of consequence is about a commission awarded to Houston sculptor Ed Wilson for an $800,000 project across from George R. Brown. We stand for the artist and public art professional Matthew Lennon. However, the entity in question, Houston Arts Alliance, is not deserving of vindictive attacks made at them or their leader, the big-picture Jonathon Glus, who has worked tirelessly to put HAA on the map. May calm and positivity prevail. It is nonetheless of vital importance that Wilson's commission be honored. And may the respected Lennon find a new position soon. For more buzz, including the outcome of this story, reviews, profiles and our new Curators and Collectors series, navigate papercitymag.com, where you can read about Chris Bramel's soda fountain turned gallery. Catherine D. Anspon thoughtful dishes that bring together the ingredients of the region with the traditions of Southern cooking. From his American take on carpaccio arises a Wagyu beef crudo with a horseradish crème fraiche ($16) and raw-bar offerings. Or try the hearty pot roast made with a fork-tender beef short rib and all the classic stew go-withs ($26) to his half-smoked then fried chicken with garlicky long beans and the requisite mashed potatoes cloaked with black pepper gravy ($22). McPherson's fare is hearty and satisfying — the sort of dishes which hold their own against Collum's new barrel-aged cocktail program where scotch, bourbon and rye tinctures are put up for weeks, then decanted tableside. Meanwhile, on weekends the Moonlight Dolls — a troupe of entertaining dancers, singers, musicians and comedians — takes center stage. Hearkening back to the days of vaudeville, they revive the art of burlesque with ornate costumes and intriguing shows that have already gained them a loyal following. 1008 Prairie St., 281.940.4636, prohibitionhouston.com. Tickets for the burlesque dinner-theater shows from $59, through themoolightdolls.com. Laurann Claridge Art Notes JANUARY | PAGE 6 | 2015 March 2014 Paper City Extraordinary residential real estate service and knowledge. Every time. 713.553.4255 M A R Y H A L E M C L E A N .C O M River Oaks SOLD! Mel Chin's The Funk & Wag from A to Z (detail), 2012, at Blaffer Art Museum Bradley Kerl's An Empty Room, 2014, at Art Palace "We're a little bit different from most galleries — we're on a mission," says William Reaves of his eponymous new space, a 5,000-square-feet former dance studio across from St. Anne's. The gallery commands respect for its founder and colleagues: next-gen art historians Sarah Foltz and Mary Margaret Kinnan, whose respective fields are early Texas (Foltz is also a fine art appraiser) and art of the Native Americans, as well as the Taos School. Reaves' ambitious expansion signals the arrival of the once esoteric field of early Texas art into the mainstream. The gallerist/co-founder of the scholarly CASETA (Center for the Advancement and Study of Early Texas Art) was an avid collector before he opened in a former River Oaks residence, which became a destination for impromptu artist salons. Flash forward nine years, and the congenial Reaves is now one of the biggest players statewide in this arena that pays homage to our roots as an art-making place, presenting offerings from 1900 to 1975, paired with contemporary regionalists. But there are far more than beautiful landscapes: WRFA represents the estates of Dick Wray, "Mr. Houston Painting," and his talented peer Jack Boynton, and stocks works by the late Dorothy Hood (subject of Susie Kalil's upcoming book and touring exhibition). Stop by on any given day, and you'll get an art history lesson about the vibrant scene that molded Houston into today's art capital. Or you might just meet some of the players, such as influential UH professor Richard Stout, Stella Sullivan and the intriguing Leila McConnell and husband Henri Gadbois; she could rival Hood in the color-field category, while his work encompasses surrealism, landscape and faux food. (Reaves is cajoling Gadbois into crafting some of his famous foodie vignettes for an upcoming show.) Also worthy of mention is Billy Hassell, known for avians rendered in a naïve style. Opening this month: Dick Wray's powerful ab ex canvases (January 9 – 31). If you're up for a coastal road trip, Reaves organizes, in collaboration with Corpus Christi's Art Museum of South Texas, "Bayou City Chic: Progressive Streams of Modern Art in Houston, 1950-1980." The show reprises a gallery exhibition mounted last spring that curated the aforementioned Hood, Wray and Stout, alongside Ibsen Espada, H.J. Bott, Perry House, Earl Staley (represented by a wild epic canvas sprinkled with glitter) and more from a rich, pivotal Houston period spanning modernism to early Lawndale (January 31 – April 26, opening reception Friday, January 30). Catherine D. Anspon Waltzing with TEXAS ART HISTORY William Reaves Fine Art., 2143 Westheimer Road, 713.521.7500, reavesart.com Anh Mai and Lian Pham are bringing the concept of dinner theater downtown with the unveiling of Prohibition Supper Club & Bar. The craft bar is housed in a historic 10,000-square-foot space that was once The Isis, the city's first silent movie theater, before it was restored years later as Mercury Room and Boca Bar. The creators of Prohibition, which was formerly in the Galleria, have broadened the scope of their original concept, which pays homage to classic craft cocktails (heightened with the keen skills of barkeep Lainey Collum), by hiring chef Ben McPherson to expand their previously limited food offerings. He has conceptualized a compelling Gulf Coast-driven menu served as à la carte dishes in the intimate front dining room for lunch and dinner and two family-style prix fixe menus during dinner-theater performances in the adjoining two-story theater space. The clubby, turn-of-the-century speakeasy environs feature a curvaceous wrought-iron staircase, plush circular cream-colored booths, red-velvet stage curtains and black-and-white marble floors. Here, McPherson trots out A SHOW & DINNER THIS JUST IN … Houston Retail Stars Explode! I f there is any lingering doubt that Houston has surpassed Chicago to become the third largest city in the country (behind New York and L.A.), we now have the retail clout to prove it — thanks to the forthcoming River Oaks District (Westheimer near 610) shopping development scheduled to open in stages late this fall and early spring 2016. New to Houston: Tom Ford, Dolce & Gabbana, Roberto Cavalli, Chopard, Kiton, Giuseppe Zanotti, Akris, Bonobos, Brioni. Brunello Cucinelli, Canali, Dior, John Lobb, deBoulle Diamond and Jewelry (out of Dallas), Dior, Diptyque, Etro, Moncler and Intermix. Already in Houston but moving to expanded store locations in River Oaks District: a two-story Hermès flagship, Cartier, Anne Fontaine and L'Occitane. Restaurants will not disappoint. Le Colonial out of San Francisco is on board, as well as American Food & Beverage, Taverna, Thirteen Pies and Toulouse Café & Bar (all out of Dallas). And, it's not just killer retail and restaurants moving in. The new center will be home to iPic Theaters and a grand two-story Equinox gym, out of L.A. More soon. Francine Ballard MAX BURKHALTER The Moonlight Dolls at Prohibition Supper Club Prohibition theater William Reaves Fine Art