Great Escapes: Group Show Featuring 12 Artists at Barry Whistler Gallery — January 25, 6-8 p.m. 2909-B Canton Street, Dallas, TX 75226.
Barry Whistler is certainly one of the best art dealers in town, but his thoughtful group shows demonstrate he is also a wonderful curator. This weekend’s exhibition, Great Escapes, mixes some high profile names (Jim Hodges) with artists from Whistler’s stable (Ann Stautberg, Danny Williams), as well as a handful of outsider artists (Robert Cargo, Burgess Dulaney). The common denominator may be eccentricity and force-of-personality, though the thematic conceit organizes around various interpretations of escape, exile, and fantasy.
The Metaphysical: New Work by Favio Moreno at The Public Trust — January 25, 6-9 p.m. 2919 Commerce Street, Suite C, Dallas, TX 75226.
Favio Moreno’s work straddles fine, street, and graphic art, and it features bold imagery culled from pop, spiritual, and ethnic sources. Judging by the promo images for this show, entitled The Metaphysical, Moreno’s latest work moves away from vivid iconography and into colorful abstraction and geometric trompe l’oeil.
Dark Markets at Oliver Francis Gallery — January 25, 7-10 p.m. 209 S. Peak Street, Dallas, TX 75226.
Fitting that the week the New York Times profiles in detail the infamous founder of the Silk Road online marketplace, Dread Pirate Roberts (a University of Texas at Dallas grad), Oliver Francis Gallery opens a show that features three artists whose work explores the internet-as-marketplace. Ann Hirsch’s adolescent relationship with a 29-year-old man played out in AOL chat rooms in the late-1990s, and now those digital archives offer plumbable material for her own mining of emotional and sexual memory. Joe Brittian sourced chemicals from exotic locals via eBay to create formally minimalist objects conceptual charged by their toxic constituents. Cheon pyo Lee’s sculptures, some participatory, investigate currency exchange networks in whimsical ways. Worth noting: all three artists are New York City-based, and this show is part of a collaboration with Bushwick’s INTERSTATE PROJECTS.
Social Distortion at Beefhaus — January 25, 7-10 p.m. 885 Exposition Ave., Dallas, TX 75226.
Beefhaus, and its loose-knit cabal of associated artists (who go by the name “Artbeef”), seems keen on leveraging its ramshackle, pub-abutting storefront space on Exposition Blvd. as a communal space. They’ve hosted exhibitions, poetry readings, and film screenings. The latest show, Social Distortion, is a collaborative project between Beefhaus’ Artbeef artists who have used Instagram and Facebook to collaborate on and critique work for the show. It’s an open-sourced, open-to-the-world approach to art making — whether or not it works, we will see. But Beefhaus has been a welcomed addition to a scene that, since Oliver Francis opened, has been wanting for copy cat art spaces.
Let The Drip from the Ceiling Become an 8 Foot Hole in the Roof at CentralTrak — January 25, 7 p.m. 800 Exposition Ave., Dallas, TX 75226.
This week a release dropped in my inbox announcing the opening of a new gallery in Deep Ellum that will launch with a solo show featuring the work of said gallery’s eponymous owner. It made me pine for the days when the storefronts owned by developer Scott Rohrman’s 42 Real Estate hosted shows curated by Jeff Gibbins, Justin Ginsberg, and others in the Apophenia Underground, a time when labeling Deep Ellum a happening art place actually made sense. Now, Gibbons and company have moved out, and the vanity art projects seem to be moving in.
Gibbons, on the other hand, has been busying himself with his own artistic practice, and will have a solo show at CentralTrak this weekend. I’m always intrigued by, even if left a little undecided about Gibbons’ work. Pieces like his animated, wall-transcending canvas machine (Boylet Toilet) feel like jokey and easily-exhausted art spectacles, while objects like his open freezer with milk curd (Chee$e) suggest a more open-ended exploration of entropic systems and systematic absurdity. One of the best things I saw at 500x two weekends ago was Gibbons’ piece — a little twisted noodle on a plinth all alone in the project space — which couldn’t look more unlike his elaborate, DIY contraptions. It reminded me of what is perhaps my favorite work by Gibbons, the vice-gripped fruit that made the artist one of the inaugural Art Ball Prize winners. I’m looking forward to getting a full dose of Gibbons in this solo exhibition, which will give the artist room to spread out and, hopefully, solidify.
Here are all of this week’s openings:
THURSDAY
Grand Opening Reception – Caldwell Arte Exposicion at Caldwell Arte Exposicion — January 23, 7-9 p.m. 103 Howell St, Dallas, Texas 75207.
The Art of Portraiture Photography at Kettle Art — January 23, 7-10 p.m. 2650-B Main Street, Dallas, Texas 75226.
Automotive Prosthetic Book Launch Party at RE Gallery — January 23, 7-9 p.m. 1717 Gould Street, Dallas, Texas 75215.
FRIDAY
Objective Strategies at El Centro College — January 24, 6-8 p.m. 801 Main Street, Dallas, Texas 75202.
Matrimoney X Lord Blakely X All That Glitters T-Shirt Release + 1 Night Exhibition at The Public Trust — January 24, 7-10 p.m. 919-C Commerce Street, Dallas, Texas 75226.
SATURDAY
Great Escapes: Group Show Featuring 12 Artists at Barry Whistler Gallery — January 25, 6-8 p.m. 2909-B Canton Street, Dallas, TX 75226.
Noble Savages at Mighty Fine Arts — January 25, 6-9 p.m. 409A N.Tyler St. Dallas, TX 75208.
Du Chau: Hanging On at Liliana Bloch Gallery — January 25, 6-9 p.m. 2919 Commerce Street, Suite C, Dallas, TX 75226.
The Metaphysical: New Work by Favio Moreno at The Public Trust — January 25, 6-9 p.m. 2919 Commerce Street, Suite C, Dallas, TX 75226.
Dark Markets at Oliver Francis Gallery — January 25, 7-10 p.m. 209 S. Peak Street, Dallas, TX 75226.
Social Distortion at Beefhaus — January 25, 7-10 p.m. 885 Exposition Ave., Dallas, TX 75226.
Let The Drip from the Ceiling Become an 8 Foot Hole in the Roof at CentralTrak — January 25, 7 p.m. 800 Exposition Ave., Dallas, TX 75226.
Image: Ann Hirsch, “Twelve” 2013. app for iPad. designed by James LaMarre
